
Oass_Xzi 



Book_Jli2> J 4 



Etoo $?tmtireo attti jftftieti) gfanttaargi of 
tjje Settlement of Nefoourg 



ti 

BRIEF 
BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES 



BY 



ROBERT NOXON TOPPAN 




NEWBURYPORT 

PUBLISHED BY THE SOCIETY 

l88q 



Fq4 

5T& 



©nibctsita JPtesa: 
John Wilson and Son, Cambridge. 






H 

'J 



BRIEF 
BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES 



BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES. 



INTRODUCTION. 

The following pages have been arranged in 
accordance with the resolution of the Historical 
Society of Old Newbury, adopted at the annual 
meeting in January, 1885, "that brief biographi- 
cal sketches of the natives and residents of Old 
Newbury, who have become prominent in the va- 
rious walks of life, should be prepared for the 
celebration of the two hundred and fiftieth anni- 
versary of the settlement of the town, which takes 
place this year." 

As the resolution enjoins brevity, only the 
principal events in the different lives will be 
mentioned. 

The outlines given, which have been drawn 
only after a careful examination of the biogra- 
phies, eulogies, writings, and published speeches 
that could be obtained, will, it is hoped, be suffi- 
cient to describe the various characters, — what 
they were, and what they did. 

It will be noticed with natural and commend- 
able pride by the present generation of Newbury, 
Newburyport, and West Newbury, — very many 



6 BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES. 

of whom are the descendants of the original gran- 
tees of the soil, and some of whom still possess the 
land inherited from their ancestors, — that there 
has been an uninterrupted line of eminent men 
from the very infancy of the settlement down to 
the present time. For two hundred and fifty years 
the chain has been unbroken. The same sturdy 
application to duty and unquestioned integrity 
which characterized the prominent men of earlier 
times have also been the characteristics of their 
successors. And it is well for us to dwell upon 
their virtues, which are the only safe foundations 
of an enduring State, that we may be stimulated 
to act as they have acted, and that we may also 
be inspired with a proper local pride, which has 
become necessary in our political development as 
a safeguard against the constantly encroaching 
power of the national government. A stronger 
barrier against the centralization of power can 
hardly be erected than by cherishing a local affec- 
tion, which will help to maintain unimpaired a 
proper local independence. 

In the ministerial office, in medical science, in 
law, and in other pursuits, eminence has been 
attained, but attained only by constant devotion 
to duty. 

The first clergymen, the Eev. Thomas Parker and 
the Eev. James Noyes, who were among the set- 
tlers of the town, were distinguished in England 
for their thorough classical scholarship, in addition 



INTEODUCTION. 7 

to their theological knowledge. By establishing 
a school at Newbury preparatory to Harvard Col- 
lege they did much to foster and maintain the high 
rank which that seat of learning held from its be- 
ginning. The successors of those clergymen were 
men of mark, much above the average in intellect 
and ability. Eev. Christopher Toppan was not 
only a theologian and classical scholar, but was 
also an expert in medicine, and is said to have 
improved the practice of surgery. Eev. John 
Lowell, who was born in Boston, but who was a 
descendant of the old Newbury family, and was 
for many years the pastor of the first parish in 
Newburyport, was a conspicuous example of piety 
and scholarship. Eev. Jonathan Parsons, who 
was for over thirty years a clergyman in New- 
buryport, where he died in 1776, at the beginning 
of our Eevolutionary struggle, was a conscientious 
and able divine. At his house died Eev. George 
Whitefield, the celebrated English evangelist, 
whose name is synonymous with energy and elo- 
quence, and whose reputation is equally great on 
both sides of the Atlantic. Eev. Dr. Edward 
Bass, although not a native of Newbury, gained 
such prominence as the rector of St. Paul's Church 
that he was elevated to the bishopric of Massa- 
chusetts from his Newburyport parish, being the 
first bishop of the State. Eev. Dr. Samuel Spring, 
many years a resident of Newburyport, was a 
sterling clergyman of the old school, whose repu- 



8 BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES. 

tation, however, has been partially eclipsed by that 
of his son, Eev. Dr. Gardiner Spring. Among 
those still living are Eev. Dr. Stephen H. Tyng, 
whose name is known throughout the land, and 
Eev. Dr. Thomas M. Clark, the present able and 
popular Bishop of Ehode Island. 

In the medical profession there has been a suc- 
cession of well-trained and skilful physicians, 
beginning with Dr. John Clark, who established 
himself in Newbury in 1638, remaining there 
until 1651, when he moved to Boston. Ac- 
cording to Mr. Joshua Coffin, Dr. Clark was 
probably the "first regularly educated physician 
who resided in New England." Among those 
who have risen to high rank may be mentioned 
the following : — 

Dr. Micajah Sawyer, who graduated at Harvard 
in 1756, and who, according to Mr. Bradford, 
"ranked among the most eminent physicians of 
his time." Dr. John Bernard Swett, a graduate of 
Harvard in the class of 1771, who, according to Mr. 
Cushing, " returned from his travels with his mind 
richly stored with professional and classical learn- 
ing ; " he died at the early age of forty-five, " fall- 
ing a sacrifice to his fidelity in the exercise of his 
profession." Dr. James Jackson became one of 
the leading physicians of Boston, and professor of 
high repute in the medical department of Harvard 
University. Dr. Nathan Noyes, a Dartmouth 
graduate of 1796, acquired the largest practice in 



INTRODUCTION. 9 

Essex County, being noted as a surgeon as well as 
a physician. Dr. Jonathan G. Johnson, graduating 
at Harvard in 1810, was well known, not only as 
an excellent practitioner, but as a man of great 
benevolence, and unwearied in his gratuitous at- 
tendance on the poor. Dr. Samuel W. Wyman, 
a classmate of the historian Prescott at Harvard 
in 1814, obtained celebrity as an oculist. Dr. 
Richard S. Spofford was for many years a lead- 
ing physician in the town, dying in 1872, at the 
advanced age of eighty-four, after attaining a very 
high rank in his profession ; while his pupil, Dr. 
Henry C. Perkins, was a devoted student in all 
branches of scientific knowledge. The line is still 
continued in the person of Dr. Frederick Irving 
Knight, a graduate of Yale of the class of 1862, 
who is one of the authorities, if not the highest, 
in his special department, and who on account 
of his attainments has been elected to the assist- 
ant professorship of laryngology in the Harvard 
Medical School. 

In the army and navy the Newbury names 
have not been so conspicuous, although Major 
Moses Titcomb displayed the qualities of an ex- 
cellent soldier at the siege of Louisburg in 1745. 
Ten years later he lost his life at the battle of 
Lake George, having risen to the rank of colonel. 
General Jacob Bailey was a prominent officer in 
the French and Revolutionary Wars. He was at 
the capture of Ticonderoga and Crown Point in 
1759, and at the surrender of Burgoyne at Sara- 



10 BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES. 

toga in 1777. Colonel Moses Little was also a 
soldier of merit of the Eevolution, and behaved 
with courage at the battle of Bunker Hill, and 
in the retreat on Long Island. He was offered the 
command of the unfortunate expedition to Penob- 
scot in 1779, but was obliged to decline on ac- 
count of ill-health. Captain Moses Brown of the 
navy distinguished himself in several engagements 
during the Bevolutionary War ; and two of Paul 
Jones's lieutenants on board the " Bon Homme 
Kichard " were Cutting Lunt and Henry Lunt, 
both natives of Newbury. In the War of 1812 
with England General John Parker Boyd behaved 
with great gallantry at the battle of Williamsburg 
and at the capture of Fort George, having pre- 
viously distinguished himself at the battle of 
Tippecanoe. In the Civil War Newbury, New- 
buryport, and West Newbury took an active part, 
contributing to the land and sea forces many offi- 
cers and men, — even more than the legal require- 
ments, — who were in no way inferior in courage 
and in military discipline to the best volunteers 
from other parts of the republic. 

In the legal profession, however, the names are 
of greater prominence. Samuel Sewall, Theophi- 
lus Bradbury, John Lowell, Theophilus Parsons, 
Charles Jackson, Simon Greenleaf, Theophilus 
Parsons, Jr., and Caleb Cushing form an illustri- 
ous line, extending over a period of more than 
two centuries, — a succession of profound jurists 
difficult to equal in any country. 



REV. THOMAS PARKER. 
1595-1677. 

The Eev. Thomas Parker, born in Wiltshire, 
England, in 1595, was the son of Eev. Eobert 
Parker, a very prominent divine and scholar, who, 
not being able conscientiously to conform to the 
Established Church, was obliged to take refuge in 
Holland after much tribulation and hot pursuit, 
where he died in 1614. Thomas, who had been a 
student at. Magdalen College, Oxford, joined his 
father in exile and entered the University of Ley- 
den, displaying unusual scholarship. Some of his 
theological essays were published, and were very 
favorably received. 

After his return to England he taught at the 
free school in Newbury for a time. In 1634 he 
sailed for New England with his relatives and in- 
timate friends, James and Nicholas Noyes and 
others from "Wiltshire, who founded the next year 
a town, to which was appropriately given the 
name of Newbury. Cotton Mather, speaking of 
Eev. Mr. Parker in his "Magnalia," says: "Ee- 
moving with several devout Christians out of 
Wiltshire into New England, he was ordained 



12 BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES. 

their pastor at a town on his and their account 
called Newberry, where he lived many years, by 
the holiness, the humbleness, the charity of his 
life giving his people a perpetual and most lively 
commentary on his doctrine." 

The river upon whose banks they first landed, 
not far from the mouth of the Merrimac, was 
named in 1697 the Eiver Parker, in honor of the 
distinguished leader and first clergyman of the 
settlement. 

To Mr. Parker belongs the principal merit of 
having established a high intellectual standard in 
the infant colony, and a broadness of views rare 
in those days of persecution. Cotton Mather says 
of him : " He was a person of most extensive char- 
ity ; which grain of his temper might contribute 
unto that largeness in his principles about church 
government which exposed him unto many temp- 
tations amongst his neighbors, who were not so 
principled." 

He was a very accomplished linguist, not only 
a classical scholar, but understanding Hebrew 
and Arabic; and so retentive was his memory 
that he was able to teach those languages when 
he became blind in his advancing years. His 
blindness was caused by his incessant application ; 
"but under this heavy calamity he was patient 
and cheerful." 

In conjunction with his cousin, the Eev. James 
Noyes, he opened a school which prepared stu- 



EEV. JAMES NOTES. 13 

dents for the new college at Cambridge. Among 
his pupils were several who became clergymen. 
The best known are the Eev. James Nbyes, who 
graduated at Harvard in 1659, the Eev. Joseph 
Gerrish, and the Kev. James Bay ley, both of whom 
graduated in 1669. The most famous of his pu- 
pils, however, was the Hon. Samuel Sewall. Mr. 
Parker, who was unmarried, survived his cousin, 
Eev. James Noyes, twenty-one years, dying in 
1677. On his tombstone in the Oldtown cemetery 
is the simple inscription : " He was a great and 
good man." 



EEV. JAMES NOYES. 
1608-1656. 

As already mentioned, the Eev. James Noyes, 
whose mother was the sister of the accomplished 
scholar, Eev. Eobert Parker, and who was born in 
Wiltshire in 1608, and was for a time a student 
at Brazennose College, Oxford, came to New Eng- 
land in 1634; and being on terms of intimate 
friendship with his cousin, Eev. Thomas Parker, 
he preferred to remain with him in Newbury, 
than accept the pastorate of a church elsewhere. 

In scholarship he was second only to Mr. Par- 
ker, and ably aided him in the preparation of 
many students for Harvard College. Mr. Parker 



14 BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES. 

speaks of him in very high terms as being a man 
of rare talents, "yet gentle and mild in all his 
expressions. ... He was courageous in dangers, 
and still was apt to believe the best, and made fair 
weather in a storm. He was much honored and 
esteemed in the country, and his death was much 
bewailed. I think he may be reckoned among 
the greatest worthies of the age." President 
Allen says of him : " He was eminently skilled 
in Greek, and he had read the Fathers and the 
Schoolmen. His memory was tenacious, his in- 
vention rich, and his judgment profound. He 
was considered one of the most eminent men of 
his day." 



REV. JOHN WOODBRIDGE. 

1613-1695. 

Rev. John Woodbridge, the son of Rev. John 
Woodbridge, was born in Wiltshire. When twenty- 
one years of age he came to New England, ac- 
companying his uncle, Rev. Thomas Parker. The 
next year, still in company with his uncle, he 
helped to lay the foundations of Newbury. In 
1641 he married a daughter of Governor Dudley, 
and three years after was chosen the first minis- 
ter of Andover, being, according to Joshua Coffin, 
" the first teacher ever ordained in this country." 



REV. JOHN WOODBRIDGE. 15 

In 1647 he went back to England, where he re- 
mained sixteen years, returning to Newbury in 
1663. From that time until his death, after 
being the temporary assistant of Mr. Parker in 
the ministry, he held various town offices, which 
he was eminently qualified to fill. His memory 
is preserved in the name of Woodbridge Island, 
near the mouth of the Merrimac Eiver ; and on 
his tombstone in the Oldtown cemetery are en- 
graved the words : " Greatly lamented as a man, 
a Christian, and a magistrate." 

His brother Benjamin, who was his junior by 
nine years, being born in Wiltshire in 1622, was 
for a time a student at Magdalen College, Oxford, 
and then entered Harvard from Newbury, grad- 
uating in 1642. This was the first class that 
graduated at Harvard College; and Benjamin 
Woodbridge's name stands first in the catalogue, 
as his social rank entitled him to that position, the 
names being arranged according to social prece- 
dence up to 1773. Dr. Calamy calls him, therefore, 
" the first-fruits of the College of New England." 
He returned to England, and upon the restoration 
of Charles II. became one of the royal chaplains. 
He preached for some years in Newbury, Eng- 
land, until silenced by the Act of Conformity, and 
finally died in England in 1684, leaving behind 
him the reputation of being a " universally accom- 
plished person, of a clear and strong reason, and 
of an exact and profound judgment." 



16 BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES. 

SAMUEL SEWALL. 

1652-1730. 

Among those who gave character and stability 
to the new settlement of Newbury was Henry 
Sewall, who belonged to a wealthy and educated 
family of Coventry, in England. He came to 
New England in 1634, and the next year joined 
Mr. Parker, Mr. Noyes, Mr. Woodbridge, and 
others in helping to establish the infant colony. 
He went back to England in 1646, after his mar- 
riage, and was settled there, according to Joshua 
Coffin, as a clergyman for thirteen years, when he 
returned to Newbury, where he continued to re- 
side until his death in 1700. His tombstone in 
the cemetery of the Oldtown church bears the 
following inscription: "Mr. Henry Sewall, sent 
by his father, Mr. Henry Sewall, in the Ship 
Elizabeth and Dorcas, Capt. Walls Commander, 
arrived at Boston 1634, wintered at Ipswich, 
helped begin this plantation 1635, furnishing 
English servants, neat cattle, and provisions. 
Married Mrs. Jane Dummer, March 25, 1640, and 
died May 16, 1700, aetat. 86. His fruitful vine 
being thus disjoined, fell to the ground January 
following. Ps. 27. 10." He was the progenitor of 
the well-known family, which has given learned 



SAMUEL SEWALL. 17 

men to the Bar and the Bench for several genera- 
tions. The most conspicuous member of the 
family, however, was his son Samuel, who was 
born in 1652, and entered Harvard College in 
1668, graduating in the class of 1671. 

Three years after graduation he commenced a 
diary, into which he entered all the details of his 
life, — even his wonderful and curious dreams, 
his great dislike to the growing custom of wear- 
ing periwigs, his abhorrence of the Quakers, the 
number of mourning scarfs and rings which he 
had received as a pall-bearer at funerals, his 
courtships, and other matters. The diary is inter- 
esting, not only on account of the personal inci- 
dents of a long and busy life, but also as giving 
a very good view of the prevailing customs and 
manners of the period. 

As a young man, Mr. Sewall had a strong de- 
sire to become a clergyman, and preached several 
times. Under date of 1675, he writes in his 
diary : " Ap. 4. Sab. day : I holp preach for my 
master (Mr. Parker) in the afternoon. Being 
afraid to look on the glass, ignorantly and unwill- 
ingly,! stood two hours and a half." He however 
turned his attention to law, and becoming prom- 
inent in his profession was in time elevated to the 
Bench. 

He married, in 1676, Miss Hull, the rich mint- 
master's daughter, who, it seems, fell in love with 
him at first sight when he appeared at Com- 
2 



18 BIOGKAPHICAL SKETCHES. 

mencement to take his degree of Master of Arts, 
and who received as her marriage-portion thirty 
thousand pounds, — a very large fortune for. those 
days. 

His religious convictions were so strong that in 
1686 he resigned his commission as captain, on 
account of the order to replace the cross in the 
English flag, which had in 1634 been cut out by 
Endicott, at the instigation of Eoger Williams. 
Mr. Sewall writes : " I was in great exercise about 
the cross to be put into the colours, and afraid, if 
I should have a hand in it, whether it may not 
hinder my entrance into the Holy Laud." 

In 1692 he was elevated to the Bench. In 
1718 he became Chief -Justice of the Colony, 
which high position he worthily occupied until 
his resignation in 1728. He was one of the 
judges who held the court at Salem before which 
were brought to trial those accused of witchcraft. 
At a time when a belief in witchcraft was almost 
universal, Judge Sewall was convinced that he 
had done wrong in acquiescing in the condemna- 
tion of the accused ; and in 1697 he made a pub- 
lic profession of his error. He gave to his pastor 
a petition, which was read from the pulpit, the 
Judge standing during the reading of it, and bow- 
ing at the conclusion : " Samuel Sewall, sensible 
of the reiterated strokes of God upon himself and 
family, and being sensible that as to the guilt 
contracted upon the opening of the late commis- 



SAMUEL SEWALL. 19 

sion of Oyer and Terminer at Salem he is upon 
many accounts more concerned than any he 
knows of, desires to take the blame and shame 
of it, asking pardon of men, and especially de- 
siring prayers that God, who has an unlimited 
authority, would pardon that sin and all other his 
sins." 

He was one of the first to protest publicly 
against slavery and the slave-trade, publishing in 
1700 a tract against the traffic of human beings, 
called the " Selling of Joseph," which begins : 
" Forasmuch as liberty is in real value next unto 
life, none ought to part with it themselves, or 
deprive others of it, but upon most mature de- 
liberation. . . . It is most certain that all men, as 
they are the sons of Adam, are coheirs, and have 
equal right unto liberty and all other outward 
comforts of life." He then goes on to point out 
that trouble may arise in introducing into the 
body politic the natives of Africa, who can never, 
he thinks, amalgamate with the white race. 

In 1716 he made an effort to have the Indian 
and negro slaves considered legally as human 
beings. He writes : "I essayed June 22 to pre- 
vent Indians and Negros being rated With Horses 
and Hogs ; but could not prevail." 

He was always fearless in expressing his opin- 
ions. During the troubles of Governor Dudley's 
administration, Judge Sewall did not hesitate to 
use forcible language against the evil ways of the 



20 BIOGKAPHICAL SKETCHES. 

government in his "Deplorable State of New 
England." 

In his disposition he was very benevolent, 
and was, as Mr. Lodge says, " clearly a gen- 
erous-minded man, not only perpetually doing 
little kindnesses, but always ready to help the 
afflicted." 

The obituary notice published at the time of 
his death speaks of "his grave and venerable 
aspect and carriage," "his abundant liberality," 
" his catholick and public spirit," and of " his 
tender concern for the aboriginal natives." 

His prophecy concerning Newbury is quaint 
and interesting, and well deserves to be quoted : 
" As long as Plum island shall faithfully keep the 
commanded Post, notwithstanding the hectoring 
words and hard blows of the proud and boisterous 
Ocean ; as long as any Salmon or Sturgeon shall 
swim in the streams of Merrimac, or any Perch 
or Pickeril in Crane Pond ; as long as the sea- 
fowl shall know the time of their coming and not 
neglect seasonably to visit the Places of their 
acquaintance ; as long as any Cattel shall be fed 
with the grass growing in the meadows, which do 
humbly bow themselves before Turkie Hill; as 
long as any Sheep shall walk upon Oldtown hills 
and shall from thence pleasantly look down upon 
the Paver Parker and the fruitful marishes lying 
beneath ; as long as any free and harmless Doves 
shall find a white Oak or other Tree within the 



REV. CHKISTOPHER TOPPAN. 21 

Township to perch, or feed, or build a careless nest 
upon, and shall voluntarily present themselves 
to perform the office of gleaners after Barley 
Harvest ; as long as nature shall not grow old or 
dote, but shall constantly remember to give the 
rows of Indian corn their education by Pairs, — so 
long shall Christians be born there, and being first 
made meet shall from thence be translated to be 
made partakers of the Inheritance of the Saints in 
Light. Now, seeing the Inhabitants of Newbury 
and of New England, upon the due observance of 
their Tenure, may expect that their rich and gra- 
cious Lord will continue and confirm them in the 
possession of those valuable Priveleges; let us 
have Grace whereby we may serve God accepta- 
bly with reverence and godly fear ; for our God 
is a consuming Fire." 



REV. CHRISTOPHER TOPPAN. 

1671-1747. 

Among the clergymen who were noted for great 
energy of character and excellent scholarship, the 
Eev. Mr. Toppan was conspicuous. He was the 
son of Dr. Peter Toppan, and graduated at Har- 
vard in 1691. Five years after graduation he 
was made pastor of the First Parish Church in 
Newbury (one of the successors of Mr. Parker), 



22 BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES. 

a position he retained for more than fifty years. 
Joshua Coffin, the historian, speaks of him as a 
"man of talents, energy, and decision of char- 
acter," and " a man that would speak his mind." 
From his father he inherited a love for the science 
of medicine, which he pursued with assiduity. 

He was on terms of intimacy with Judge Sew- 
all, whose eldest sister married his uncle, Jacob 
Toppan, a younger marrying William Longfellow, 
of Newbury, the ancestor of Longfellow, the poet. 

Mr. Toppan took up the cause of the Indians ; 
in a letter to Judge Sewall he says : " The Indians 
should have convenient lands allowed them for 
themselves and their posterity, as they were the 
first proprietors of the lands in this country." 
His letter to Cotton Mather has been often quoted. 
Mr. Mather, who was a firm believer in super- 
natural things, had heard that a double-headed 
snake had been seen in Newbury. He therefore 
writes to his friend Mr. Toppan to investigate the 
affair. In his answer Mr. Toppan says : " Concern- 
ing the amphisbena, as soon as I received your 
commands I made diligent enquiry of several per- 
sons, who saw it after it was dead, but they could 
give me no assurance of its having two heads." 
He finally found some one who affirmed that the 
snake really had two heads ; and he adds in his 
letter : — 

" This person is so credible that I can as much 
believe him as if I had seen him myself. He 



REV. CHRISTOPHER TOPPAN. 23 

tells me of another man that examined it as he 
did, but I cannot yet meet him. 

" Postscript. Before ensealing I spoke with the 
other man who examined the amphisbena (and he 
also is a man of credit), and he assures me that it 
had really two heads, one at each end, two mouths, 
two stings or tongues, and so forth. 

" Sir, I have nothing more to add but that he 
may have a remembrance in your prayers, who is, 

"Sir, your most humble servant, 

" Christopher Toppan." 

The story has been put into a poetical form by 
Whittier, under the title of " The Double-headed 
Snake of Newbury." 

After filling faithfully the pastorate for more 
than half a century, Mr. Toppan died in 1747. 
On his tombstone in the burying-ground of the 
Oldtown church is the following inscription : 
" Here lyes the Body of the Eev. Mr. Christopher 
Toppan, Master of Arts, fourth Pastor of the 
First Church in Newbury, a gentleman of good 
Learning, conspicuous Piety, and Virtue, shining 
both by his Doctrine and Life, skilled and greatly 
improved in the Practise of Physic and Surgery, 
who deceased July 23, 1747, in the 76th year of 
his age and the 51st of his Pastoral office." 



24 BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES. 



WILLIAM DUMMER. 
1677-1761. 

Among the wealthy proprietors of Newbury 
was the Dummer family, who owned over a thou- 
sand acres of land, and whose intelligence and 
character gave stability to the young colony. 

In 1640 Mr. Eichard Duinmer assisted Gov- 
ernor AVinthrop with unexpected liberality, Mr. 
Winthrop being much straitened pecuniarily by 
the unfaithfulness of his bailiff. The different 
towns contributed £500 for the relief of the Gov- 
ernor, and Mr. Dummer gave from his fortune 
£100. Mr. Savage says: "The generosity of 
Dummer is above all praise. His contribution 
is fifty per cent above the whole tax of his town, 
and equal to half the benevolence of the whole 
metropolis ; yet he had been a sufferer under the 
mistaken views of Winthrop and other trium- 
phant sound religionists." 

Mr. William Dummer, who was born in 1677, 
was appointed Lieutenant-Governor in 1716, and 
was Acting Chief Magistrate from 1723 to 1729. 
He was upright and courteous, and " enjoyed in 
a great degree the confidence of the people." He 
bequeathed his valuable estate and fine mansion 



BENJAMIN GEEENLEAF. 25 

near Newburyport for the endowment of Dum- 
mer Academy, which was the first incorporated 
in the Colony. Ever since its foundation in 1763, 
it has maintained and still maintains a very high 
rank, and has upon its rolls, as graduates, many 
of the prominent men of the country. 



BENJAMIN GREEN LEAF. 
1732-1799. 

Several members of the Greenleaf family have 
achieved prominence. The two best known, how- 
ever, are Benjamin, born in 1732, and Simon, the 
eminent law professor, whose birth was fifty years 
later. 

Graduating at Harvard College in 1751, Mr. 
Benjamin Greenleaf's talents and integrity placed 
him early among the foremost citizens of his 
native town. He was for several years a repre- 
sentative to the General Court before the Eevolu- 
tionary War broke out. Being a decided partisan 
of the rights of the Colonies, he was chosen one 
of the Executive Council of Massachusetts and 
then one of the Committee of Safety for the 
Province. 

After the adoption of the Constitution he was 
elected to the State Senate. He was then ap- 
pointed Chief-Justice of the Court of Common 



26 BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES. 

Pleas, and was subsequently for a long period of 
time Judge of Probate for the County of Essex. 

His various official positions he filled with 
signal ability ; and he died much respected for his 
sterling qualities. 



TRISTRAM DALTON. 

1738-1817. 

Mr. D alton was a good example of a gentle- 
man of the old school, polished, refined, and well 
educated. He graduated at Harvard in 1755. 
Being elected representative from Newburyport, 
and having served with distinction, he was made 
Speaker of the House of Representatives of the 
State, which position he filled with dignity. He 
then became a member of the State Senate, and 
upon the adoption of the National Constitution, 
was elected the first Senator of the United States 
from Massachusetts. 

Mr. Dalton was on terms of intimate friend- 
ship with the first four Presidents of the United 
States. " Washington honored him with his con- 
fidence and regard, as did also his illustrious 
classmate, John Adams. Yet, like all genuine 
gentlemen, he could take an affectionate interest 
in his dependants and the poor, black and white. 
He was kind and considerate to his servants, of 



THEOPHILUS BKADBUKY. 27 

whom he had a large retinue at one time. In figure 
he was tall and finely formed, and added to great 
personal beauty the most graceful and accom- 
plished manners. . . . He was diligent, exemplary, 
and accomplished as a scholar. . . . His piety was 
ardent and sincere." 

Towards the close of his life he was reduced 
from affluence to poverty, from unfortunate spec- 
ulations and the unfaithfulness of an agent ; but 
" with manners so gentle and attractive as his, a 
mind so cultivated, integrity so spotless, he had 
the satisfaction of finding that no diminution of 
respect accompanied his loss of property." 



THEOPHILUS BRADBURY. 
1739-1803. 

Aftek graduating at Harvard College in 1757, 
and going through the usual course of legal study, 
Mr. Theophilus Bradbury began, in 1761. the 
practice of his profession in Falmouth, now the 
city of Portland. Among his law pupils in that 
town was Theophilus Parsons, afterwards Chief- 
Justice of Massachusetts. 

Falmouth being burnt by the British in 1775, 
Mr. Bradbury returned to Newburyport, where 
he soon rose to distinction. After serving as 
representative and State senator, he was elected 



28 BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES. 

a member of Congress during Washington's ad- 
ministration, and in 1797 was made a Justice of 
the Supreme Court of Massachusetts, a position 
he "filled with great intelligence and fidelity. . . 
He resigned the emoluments arising from his 
practice for the appointment of a judge, in which 
station he was faithful and intelligent in executing 
the laws." Although he " devoted himself to the 
profession of the law, he did not neglect science 
and literature, and was made a member of the 
American Academy of Arts and Sciences." 



JONATHAN JACKSON. 
1743-1810. 

Among the public-spirited and enterprising 
merchants of Newburyport, was Jonathan Jack- 
son, who graduated at Harvard College in 1761. 
Although born in Boston he became early a res- 
ident of Newburyport, and was fully identified 
with the interests and prosperity of his adopted 
home. He served for a time as a member of the 
Provincial Congress. In 1777 he was elected 
representative from Newburyport to the State 
Legislature. In 1782 he became a member of 
the Congress of the Old Confederation, and in 
1789 was appointed by Washington to be Marshal 



JOHN LOWELL. 29 

for Massachusetts. Among his other public trusts 
he was for a time the Treasurer of the Common- 
wealth and Treasurer of Harvard College. 

He is noted as being among the early oppo- 
nents of slavery in the State. Two weeks before 
the Declaration of Independence he gave freedom 
to a slave owned by him. In the certificate declar- 
ing the freedom of the slave, he writes : " I, Jona- 
than Jackson of Newburyport, in consideration of 
the impropriety I feel, and long have felt, in hold- 
ing any person in constant bondage, more espe- 
cially at the time when my country is so warmly 
contending for the liberty everybody ought to en- 
joy, and also in consideration of promises to my 
negro man Pomp, I hereby give him his freedom." 

Mr. Bradford, in his "Biographical Notices," 
speaks of Mr. Jackson as being " one of the most 
polished men of his time, very gentlemanly and 
courteous in his deportment, but without parade 
or ostentation." And Judge Theophilus Parsons 
used to speak of him as the "embodiment of 
sound sense and absolute integrity." 



JOHN LOWELL. 
1743-1802. 



The Lowell family was among the earliest of 
the settlers of Newbury, the name of John Lowle, 
afterwards changed to Lowell, being found among 



30 BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES. 

the original grantees. The family was as prolific 
in eminent lawyers and judges as were the Sew- 
all and Cushing families, in which legal talent 
seemed to be hereditary. Some of the Lowells, 
however, have achieved success in other pursuits ; 
while James Eussell Lowell, who is a descendant 
of the family, has won for himself a well-de- 
served reputation in literature and diplomacy on 
both sides of the Atlantic. 

The Christian name, John, appears to have been 
handed down from father to son for many gen- 
erations. John Lowell, the eminent judge, was 
the son of the Eev. John Lowell, a man of con- 
siderable attainments and unblemished character, 
ut jii whose tombstone was inscribed that " he was 
a gentleman w ""1 skilled in the learned languages, 
of great read.; g and extensive knowledge, of con- 
spicuous pic 'y and virtue, and of talents pecul- 
iarly adapted to the ministerial office. "While he 
lived he was highly respected and beloved by his 
people, for whose welfare he had a tender and 
affectionate concern, and was honored and greatly 
lamented by them when he died." 

John Lowell, the son, was born in Newbury in 
1743, graduated at Harvard in 1760, and after 
studying law was admitted to the Bar in 1762. 
He soon won the esteem and confidence of his 
fellow-townsmen, and was elected by them, in 
1776, to represent Newburyport at the General 
Court. The next year he moved to Boston, which 



JOHN LOWELL. 31 

presented a larger field for his talents. His 
abilities being immediately recognized, he was 
elected, in 1778, to the State Legislature, to repre- 
sent his adopted home. In 1780, as member of 
the Convention to decide upon a constitution for 
the State, he was the author of the clause in the 
Bill of Eights declaring that "all men are born 
free and equal," for the express purpose of abolish- 
ing slavery in the Commonwealth. 

In 1782 he became a member of the Congress 
of the old Confederation. The following year 
he was appointed Judge of the Admiralty Court 
of Appeals, which position he held until 1789, 
when, upon the establishment of the national 
government, he was made District Judge of z % 
United States for Massachusetts, 't^d in 1801 
became Chief -Justice of the new Lxxcuit Court, 
which included Massachusetts, Maine/ 'Rhode Isl- 
and, and New Hampshire. His ' various official 
positions he filled with marked ability. 

He was not merely a jurist, but was also in- 
terested in science, being a member and counsellor 
of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, 
before which body he delivered an able and inter- 
esting eulogy in 1791, upon the late distinguished 
President James Bowdoin. 

Mr. Caleb Cushing, in his "History of New- 
buryport," speaks of him in high terms, saying: 
" He was eminent for his judgment, integrity, and 
eloquence as an advocate and legislator, for his 



32 BIOGKAPHICAL SKETCHES. 

impartiality, acuteness, and decision as a judge, 
and for his zeal in the cause of scientific and 
other useful institutions." 



WILLIAM BARTLET. 
1748-1841. 

A descendant of one of the old settlers of New- 
bury, Mr. William Bartlet was the type of an 
old-fashioned New England merchant. His in- 
tegrity was unquestioned, and his energy and 
business talent great. " He conciliated, therefore, 
a general confidence both at home and abroad." 
His commercial enterprises, which were large for 
those days, were crowned with success, but he 
did not confine himself to commerce. " It was 
he who started the first woollen and the first cot- 
ton mill in By field; it was he who encouraged 
the small manufacturers when machinery was 
scarce and steam power unused." Having ac- 
quired a large fortune, "his ambition urged him 
to the performance of good deeds, to help the 
needy and especially to advance the cause of 
religion and morals. The Temperance reforma- 
tion, the Foreign Missionary enterprise, and the 
gratuitous education of young men for the min- 
istry were objects of his especial regard and 



THEOPHILUS PAESONS. 33 

munificence." Principally through his efforts and 
generosity, in conjunction with Mr. Moses Brown, 
of Newbury port, and Mr. John Norris, of Salem, 
the Theological School was established at Andover 
in 1808. It is said that the gifts from Mr. Bart- 
let to the School amounted to what was then the 
large sum of a quarter of a million of dollars. 

" Full of years, and crowned with the benedic- 
tion appertaining to a faithful steward of God's 
bounty, he died in his native place in 1841, aged 
93." 



THEOPHILUS PARSONS. 

1750-1813. 

Among the most profound jurists that America 
has ever produced, must be placed the name of 
Theophilns Parsons, son of the Eev. Moses Par- 
sons, who was born in Byfield, a parish of New- 
bury, in 1750. He was prepared for college at 
Duramer Academy, under the tuition of Mr. 
Samuel Moody, an accomplished scholar, under 
whose auspicas the Academy maintained a high 
rank. Having graduated at Harvard in 1769, 
with very high honors, he took charge of a school 
at Falmouth, now Portland. While teaching school 
he studied law in the office of Mr. Theophilus 
Bradbury, a fellow-townsman, who afterwards be- 
came a distinguished judge in Massachusetts. 



34 BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES. 

Upon applying for admission to the Bar in 1774, 
a question arose as to his eligibility, his three 
years of legal study having been interrupted by 
his teaching. His examination was, however, 
so brilliant that he was admitted by the unani- 
mous consent of the Board of Examiners. 

Falmouth having been destroyed by the British 
in 1775, Mr. Parsons returned to his father's house 
in Byfield, where he had the good fortune to meet 
Judge Edmund Trowbridge, one of the most ac- 
complished lawyers in New England, who had 
taken refuge there to escape the troubles and dan- 
ger of the approaching contest between the colo- 
nies and the mother country. Judge Trowbridge 
had with him his valuable law library, to which 
Mr. Parsons had free access ; and the Judge, find- 
ing a willing and able pupil, poured out the treas- 
ures of his legal knowledge. The event which 
Mr. Parsons thought would be disastrous to him, 
proved to be the foundation of his greatness. 

In 1777 he opened his law office in Newbury- 
port, and rose immediately to prominence. The 
very next year he was chosen one of the delegates 
from Newburyport to the Ipswich Convention, 
with Tristram Dalton, Jonathan Greenleaf, Jon- 
athan Jackson, and Stephen Cross, to discuss the 
draught of a State constitution. The result of their 
deliberations is known as the "Essex Eesult," 
written, it is said, entirely by Mr. Parsons, although 
one of the youngest of the delegates. In this 



THEOPHILUS PARSONS. 35 

" Besult " are given the reasons for rejecting the 
proposed constitution; and the influence of that 
able paper was sufficient to defeat the adoption of 
it. In the " Eesult " Mr. Parsons lays down what 
he considers the fundamental principles of civil 
government. He believed fully in the representa- 
tion of property, insisting that the Governor of 
the State ought to have a property qualification, 
as well as the senators, and even the electors of 
the senators. He says : " The legislative body 
should be so constructed that every law affecting 
property should have the consent of those who 
held the majority of the property." As the lower 
House would represent people and not property, 
the members of that branch of the Legislature need 
not have a property qualification ; but " in electing 
members for the Senate, let the representation of 
property be attended to. . . . Each freeman of the 
State who is possessed of a certain quantity of 
property may be an elector of the senators." He 
dwells also strongly upon the necessity of estab- 
lishing and maintaining the complete indepen- 
dence of the judiciary, and then speaks of the 
dangers of bribery, saying : " Would one venture 
to prophesy that in a century from this period, 
we shall be a corrupt, luxurious people, perhaps 
the close of this century would stamp the proph- 
ecy with the title of history." 

In 1780 he married the daughter of Judge 
Benjamin Greenleaf. 



36 BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES. 

His untiring application raised him to the high- 
est rank in his profession ; and so great became 
his reputation that he was called the "Giant 
of the Law," and students came to Newburyport 
to take advantage of his instruction. Among 
the most eminent of his pupils were John Quincy 
Adams, Eufus King, and Eobert Treat Paine, the 
poet, who became widely known on account of 
the eulogy he delivered in Newbury port upon 
the occasion of the funeral services for General 
Washington. 

In the convention held for voting upon the 
acceptance or rejection of the National Constitu- 
tion, Mr. Parsons threw the weight of his influence 
and intellect in favor of adoption, considering the 
proposed constitution the best that could be es- 
tablished under the circumstances. He was not, 
however, entirely satisfied with all of its provisions; 
and he proposed what was afterwards adopted as 
one of the amendments, " that all powers not 
expressly delegated by the aforesaid Constitution 
are reserved to the several States." 

In 1800 Mr. Parsons moved to Boston. Be- 
fore leaving his native place, the gentlemen of 
Newburyport gave him a dinner, in appreciation 
of his talents and worth. At the dinner Mr. 
Parsons proposed as his toast: "The town of 
Newburyport, may the blessing of Heaven rest 
upon it, as long as its shores are washed by the 
Merrimac." 



THEOPHILUS PARSONS. 37 

In 1801 he was offered the position of Attorney 
General of the United States, but he declined the 
honor. In 1806 he was made Chief-Justice of 
the State, a position he filled with signal ability. 
So untiring was his industry that he was able 
to clear the docket, — an example which ought 
to be followed by many of his successors on the 
Bench. 

Not only was Mr. Parsons one of the most 
profound jurists that America has ever produced, 
but he was also a classical, Hebrew, and French 
scholar of great attainments, a mathematician so 
excellent that he could in that science have taken 
the foremost rank, and an enthusiastic student of 
natural science. His personal appearance was 
commanding, and his eyes were very penetrating. 

His religious views were broad and liberal. In 
deciding a case in which a clause of the State 
constitution relating to religious liberty was in- 
troduced, he said : " Its object was to prevent any 
hierarchy or ecclesiastical jurisdiction of one sect 
of Christians over any other sect; and the sect 
of Soman Catholics are as fully entitled to the 
benefit of this clause, as any society of Protestant 
Christians. It was also intended to prevent any 
religious test as a qualification for office. There- 
fore, those Catholics who renounce all obedience 
and subjection to the Pope as a foreign prince or 
prelate, may, notwithstanding their religious tenets, 
hold any civil office, although the constitution 



38 BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES. 

has not provided for the support of any public 
teacher of the popish religion." 

Some years after his decease, in 1836, his 
principal decisions were published under the title 
of "Commentaries on American Law." 

Judge Isaac Parker says of him : " Never was 
fame more early or more just than that of Parsons 
as a lawyer. At an age when most of the pro- 
fession are but beginning to exhibit their talents, 
to take a fixed rank at the Bar, he was confessedly, 
in point of legal knowledge, among the first of its 
professors." 

Among his many friends and admirers may be 
mentioned the name of Alexander Hamilton, with 
whom he appears to have been in the habit of 
corresponding. 



NATHANIEL TRACY. 
1751-1796. 

Although the merchants of Newburyport were 
at one time famous for their skill and enterprise, 
no one was more successful than Patrick Tracy, 
who acquired a large estate by his industry and 
prudence. His son Nathaniel, who graduated at 
Harvard College in 1769, entered upon a mercan- 
tile career, for which he was eminently qualified 
from his position and training ; but the Kevo- 



NATHANIEL TKACY. 39 

lutionary War soon breaking out, he devoted 
himself to the cause of independence. To him 
belongs the honor of equipping and sending out 
the first privateer which sailed from the United 
Colonies against England. During the Eevolu- 
tionary struggle he was the principal owner of 
nearly fifty cruisers, which captured one hundred 
and twenty vessels from the enemy. These prizes, 
with their cargoes, were sold for $3,951,000, — a 
very large amount, which would be equivalent at 
the present time to nearly twenty millions of dol- 
lars. The number of prisoners taken by his ves- 
sels was 2,225. As the Government was often in 
urgent need of money, Mr. Tracy made advances 
at different times, until his gifts amounted to 
nearly two hundred thousand dollars. 

Mr. Tracy was a courteous and refined gentle- 
man, living in a sort of patriarchal style. To his 
house, which is now the Public Library of the 
city, were naturally invited all distinguished vis- 
itors to Newburyport. Washington, Lafayette, 
Arnold, Aaron Burr, Talleyrand, Louis Philippe, 
and others partook of his generous hospitality. 



40 BIOGKAPHICAL SKETCHES. 



REV. ELIPHALET PEARSON. 
1752-1826. 

Having been prepared for college by Mr. 
Moody at the Dummer Academy, Mr. Pearson 
graduated at Harvard, in the class of 1773, with 
high honors. His Commencement part, on the 
" Legality of Enslaving the Africans," was consid- 
ered so remarkable that it was published. After 
being the Principal of the Andover Academy for 
some years, he was elected, on account of his 
great attainments, to the Professorship of Hebrew 
and Oriental Languages in Harvard University, a 
position he occupied with marked success from 
1786 to 1806. His lectures at Cambridge, which 
have not been printed, are said to bear the marks 
of great ability. In 1808 he became the Professor 
of Sacred Literature at the Andover Theological 
Seminary, which was established that year. 

Mr. Bradford says : " Dr. Pearson possessed 
a strong mind, was a sound logician, and in 
philology excelled most of the scholars of his 
time." The Rev. Mr. Waldo, in speaking of 
him, says : " He had a noble, commanding per- 
son, which looked like a tower of strength. . . . 
His vast treasures of knowledge were always at 
his command." 



WILLIAM PLUMER. 41 

WILLIAM PLUMER. 

1759-1850. 

A descendant of one of the original grantees 
of Newbury, William Plumer was born there 
nine years before his father moved with his 
family to New Hampshire, to make that State 
his future home. 

During his boyhood he had shown such intel- 
lectual capacity as to attract the attention of 
Rev. Mr. Parsons, devouring the contents of all 
the books that came in his way. So strongly 
impressed was he at one time with religious fer- 
vor as a Baptist, that he preached in different 
parts of the State to large numbers of people ; 
his theological views soon changed, however, when 
he began to apply, as he himself says, reason to 
religion ; he became " a conspicuous and faithful 
champion, throughout his life, of religious liberty." 

Before being admitted to the Bar, in 1787, he 
had already been elected a State Representative, 
a. position to which he was repeatedly chosen. 
In 1791 he was made Speaker of the House, and 
the next year he was a very active member of the 
State Constitutional Convention. In 1802 he was 
chosen a Senator of the United States, being con- 
sidered " the ablest man in the Federal party of 



42 BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES. 

the State. ... He acted with the Federal party on 
all leading measures, but never sacrificed his in- 
dependence by blind adherence to party policy." 
For a short time he showed a willingness to unite 
with the Northern extremists, who desired a sepa- 
ration of the Union, but when he became Governor 
of the State, in 1812, after being President of the 
State Senate, he obeyed without hesitation the 
requisitions of the National Government in prose- 
cuting the war with England. He was re-elected 
to the governorship several times, and in that 
office evinced independence of character by select- 
ing for various positions those who were qualified, 
regardless of their political sentiments. " He was 
sincere and fearless in the discharge of duty and 
in the expression of his convictions." 

After retiring from public life he made prepa- 
rations to write a general history of the country. 
In a letter to him, John Quincy Adams says : " It 
affords me constant pleasure to recollect that the 
history of our country has fallen into the hands 
of such a man." Unfortunately, this history was 
never completed. He also collected material for 
writing biographical sketches of prominent Ameri- 
cans, but that work was never finished. " From 
1820 to 1829 he published in the newspapers a 
series of essays upon various topics, extending 
to one hundred and eighty-six numbers, which 
had a wide circulation and attracted considerable 
attention." 



REV. SAMUEL WEBBER. 43 

He was a member of many learned bodies, and 
was the first President of the New Hampshire 
Historical Society. 

" In person he was tall and erect, his complexion 
dark, his hair black, and his eyes black and spark- 
ling." "Possessing a vigorous and inquisitive 
mind, as well as great industry, he became one 
of the best scholars of the Granite State ; " and 
his legal knowledge was such that he was con- 
sidered a fit opponent at the Bar, of Webster, 
Parsons, and Mason. 



REV. SAMUEL WEBBER. 
1760-1810. 

The Rev. Samuel "Webber, a native of Byfield, 
a parish of Newbury, graduated in 1784, with 
high honors, from Harvard College. After having 
had charge of Dummer Academy for a time, he 
was called to a tutorship in Harvard College, and 
then promoted to the Hollis Professorship of 
Mathematics and Natural Philosophy, and finally 
made President of the University in 1806. His 
career as President was very short, lasting scarcely 
four years. 

Dr. Henry Ware, in pronouncing the funeral 
discourse, spoke in high terms of the deceased 
President. He said : " His undeviating rectitude 



44 BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES. 

inspired confidence, his superior talents and at- 
tainments gave him a highly respectable standing 
among his fellow-students ; he gave an honorable 
example of diligent application to study and zeal 
in the pursuit of knowledge ; he was endeared to 
all who had an opportunity of an intimate ac- 
quaintance by his habitual mildness, candor, and 
gentleness of manner." Speaking of his career as 
a scholar, Dr. Ware said: "He was capable of 
sustaining long-continued and intense application 
to study." His scientific attainments were very 
great, and he was consecpiently a member of 
many learned societies. 



JOHN PARKER BOYD. 
1764-1830. 

The life of John Parker Boyd was a singular 
one for an American, having been a general in 
the East Indies, commanding at one time, it is 
said, ten thousand cavalry. 

He returned to the United States and obtained 
a commission as colonel in the Eegular Army in 
1808. He behaved with skill and bravery at the 
battle of Tippecanoe in 1811 ; and during the War 
of 1812 with England, he was with his command 
at the battle of Williamsburg, and at the capture 
of Fort George, having been raised to the rank of 
brigadier-general. 



JACOB PERKINS. 45 

He published, in 1816, "Documents and Facts 
Eelative to Military Events during the Late War," 
a small pamphlet in defence of his conduct, which 
had been assailed. 



JACOB PERKINS. 
1766-1849. 

The career of Jacob Perkins as an inventor was 
a remarkable one. Without special mechanical 
training or education, he achieved such success as 
to establish a high reputation on both sides of 
the Atlantic. 

He was early employed in making dies and 
machinery for the copper money issued by Massa- 
chusetts before the adoption of the National Con- 
stitution. He then turned his attention to the 
prevention of the counterfeiting of bank-notes. 
His efforts were so successful that the State 
ordered that all the notes issued within its juris- 
diction must be made according to Mr. Perkins's 
plan. His discovery of a process by which steel 
plates could be hardened without injuring the 
engraved surface was an important step in the 
development of bank-note engraving. Very many 
more impressions could be taken from the hard- 
ened than from the ordinary steel or copper plate, 
diminishing greatly the cost of production, while 
the beauty of the engraving was uninjured. 



46 . BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES. 

In 1816 Mr. Perkins went to Philadelphia to 
enter the employment of Messrs. Draper, Murray, 
& Fairman, the well-known bank-note engraving 
house. In 1819 he accompanied Mr. Fairman 
and Mr. Toppan to Europe, with the expectation 
of inducing the Bank of England to accept his 
plan, as the notes of that Bank had been counter- 
feited; but the Bank declined their proposals, 
deeming the price asked by Mr. Perkins too high, 
and it was not until after the expiration of the 
patent that the directors availed themselves of his 
process. Other banks "and banking houses took 
advantage, however, of Mr. Perkins's skill, and the 
firm then established continues to exist at the 
present time in London. 

Mr. Perkins's inventive faculties were employed 
in many fields : he was the first to make nails by 
machinery ; he was also the first to demonstrate 
the compressibility of water; he experimented 
with the new and wonderful power of steam, in- 
venting a steam cannon in which the Duke of 
Wellington and other military and scientific gen- 
tlemen were much interested. His system of 
warming houses by means of hot-water pipes is 
still used in England. 

His scientific attainments, courtesy of manner, 
and genial temperament made him a welcome 
guest in English society. 

He did not return to the United States, but 
remained in London, where he died in 1849. 



JOHN LOWELL. 47 

JOHN LOWELL. 
1769-1840. 

Eight years before his father, the Judge, moved 
to Boston with his family, to make that city his 
future home, John Lowell was born in New- 
buryport. 

After graduating at Harvard College in 1786, 
he studied law and was admitted to the Boston 
Bar in due course. He soon rose to prominence, 
and became one of the acknowledged leaders of 
his profession. 

He served for a time as representative and 
State senator with great ability and influence. 
He was an indefatigable student, not only of 
jurisprudence, but of theology and the natural 
sciences, particularly of botany. 

His writings, which were numerous, were 
mainly upon topics of the time, which he han- 
dled with consummate skill. His papers upon 
the religious question which was then agitating 
the thinking people of the State, were strongly 
in favor of what is called Liberal Christianity. 
His views are strongly expressed in his essay 
upon "The Eight to Change the Ecclesiastical 
Constitution of the Congregational Churches of 
Massachusetts." In that essay he says : " I deny 



48 BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES. 

all ecclesiastical jurisdiction. I think conscien- 
tiously that it is the most monstrous and wicked 
of all usurpations. It is sinning against all light, 
to assume the smallest control over the con- 
sciences of men under color of scriptural author- 
ity." In the same essay he quotes a decision of 
Chief- Justice Parsons, who says : " Our ancestors 
came to this country smarting from the rod of the 
hierarchy then in power in the country from which 
they emigrated. They were hostile to any eccle- 
siastical coercive jurisdiction whatever in all mat- 
ters of doctrine and discipline, as repugnant to the 
liberties of the churches ; and although synods were 
holden, and councils of the churches convened, yet 
no compulsory authority was vested in them ; and 
the utility of any ecclesiastical coercive power has 
been doubted, as tending to repress a free and 
liberal inquiry after truth, and to substitute for 
the errors of heresy sometimes questionable, the 
vice of hypocrisy always censurable." 

In politics Mr. Lowell was an ardent Federalist ; 
and he attacked the administration of Madison 
with great vigor, decrying the war with England 
and questioning the constitutionality of the em- 
bargo. 

Edward Everett speaks of him as "possessing 
colloquial powers of the highest order, and wield- 
ing an accurate, elegant, and logical pen." 



EEV. CHARLES COFFIN. 49 



FKANCIS CABOT LOWELL. 

1775-1817. 

Another son of Judge Lowell was Francis 
Cabot, graduating at Harvard College in 1793. 
He became much interested in introducing cotton 
manufactures into Massachusetts, and aided by 
his brother-in-law, Mr. Jackson, established some 
of the first mills. Mr. Bradford says of him : " He 
had an uncommon spirit of activity and enterprise, 
but united with caution and good judgment." 

The city of Lowell was named for him, — a 
distinction he had fairly earned. 



REV. CHARLES COFFIN. 
1775-1853. 

The Eev. Charles Coffin was the son of Dr. 
Charles Coffin, a physician of Newburyport. 
After graduating at Harvard College in 1793, 
where he was noted as a very diligent student, 
he studied theology, and was licensed to preach in 
his native town in 1804, the ordination sermon 
being delivered by the Eev. Dr. Samuel Spring. 



50 BIOGKAPHICAL SKETCHES. 

In 1810 he was elected President of Green- 
ville College in Tennessee, where he remained 
until 1827, when he accepted the presidency of 
Knoxville College, a position he filled with dis- 
tinguished ability for six years. 

Eev. Dr. McCorkle says : " He had well-formed 
features, expressive countenance, and was in his 
whole bearing benignant, dignified, and venerable 
He possessed excellent intellectual powers, which 
he retained in great vigor to the last." 



CHARLES JACKSON. 

1775-1855. 

All the sons of Mr. Jonathan Jackson, the pub- 
lic-spirited merchant of Newburyport, inherited 
their father's energy and perseverance. After 
graduating at Harvard College in 1793, with very 
high honors, Mr. Charles Jackson studied law 
with his fellow-townsman, Theophilus Parsons, 
who spoke in terms of great praise of his applica- 
tion and talent, saying, " Of all my pupils no one 
has left my office better fitted for his profession." 
Mr. Caleb dishing, in his " History of Newbury- 
port," adds his testimony to Mr. Jackson's capac- 
ity, saying, "He rose quickly to the front ranks 
of the Bar, and became only second to his master 
in forensic distinction." 



CHARLES JACKSON. 51 

In 1803 he moved to Boston, where his talent 
was immediately recognized. In 1813 he was ap- 
pointed a Justice of the Supreme Court of the 
State, a position he occupied until his resigna- 
tion in 1823, on account of failing health. His 
qualifications for a position on the Bench were 
universally conceded. Mr. George Lunt, a native 
of Newbury port, the lawyer, author, and journal- 
ist, speaks in a short memoir of " the impartial- 
ity of Judge Jackson, which amounted as nearly 
as possible to the exemplification of abstract 
justice." 

Mr. Lunt adds, " He was a gentleman by nature, 
sentiment, and cultivation. During his whole life 
he was beloved, esteemed, and respected. He dies 
without a blot upon his memory." 

In England his reputation was almost as great 
as in his own country. Upon visiting Europe, he 
was cordially welcomed by his brethren of the 
Bar, and the celebrated Lord Stowell became his 
warm personal friend. 

The only work of importance published by 
Judge Jackson was a " Treatise on the Pleadings 
and Practice in Eeal Actions." 



52 BIOGKAPHICAL SKETCHES. 

DR. JAMES JACKSON. 
1777-1867. 

The second son of Mr. Jonathan Jackson was 
named James, who graduated at Harvard College 
in the class of 1796. Having received his medical 
degree and begun the practice of his profession, he 
rose rapidly to prominence in Boston. 

He was elected to a professorship in the medical 
department of Harvard University in 1810, which 
he continued to fill until 1835, when he was made 
emeritus professor. 

He was much interested in the establishment 
of hospitals, and did much to contribute to their 
foundation. When the Massachusetts General 
Hospital was established by his efforts, in con- 
junction with Dr. Warren, he was the first physi- 
cian appointed to take charge of it. 

He wrote many articles of merit relating to his 
profession, and was also the author of the "Eulogy 
on the Character of Dr. John Warren," and of the 
" Petition to Her Majesty, Queen of Great Britain 
and Ireland, on behalf of Dr. Morton, the dis- 
coverer of Etherization." 



PATRICK TRACY JACKSON. 53 

PATRICK- TRACY JACKSON. 
1780-1847. 

Like his brothers, Mr. Patrick Tracy Jackson 
had great energy and perseverance. He was one 
of the pioneers, with his brother-in-law, Francis C 
Lowell, in introducing the cotton manufacture 
into the United States. It is said that the mill 
built by them, with the assistance of Paul Moody, 
the mechanician and inventor, at Waltham in 
1813, was the first established in the world that 
combined all the operations for converting raw 
cotton into finished cloth. 

It is somewhat singular that the three principal 
promoters of the manufacture of cotton were from 
Newbury, Mr. Moody having been born in By- 
field in 1779. He evinced so much mechanical 
talent that Mr. Jacob Perkins took him into his 
employment and placed him in charge of his 
workshop. He aided Messrs. Lowell and Jackson 
materially in the construction of their machinery, 
and in his inventions, which were of great value. 

After the establishment of some mills at Lowell, 
Mr. Jackson conceived the idea of uniting Boston 
with Lowell by steam, the experiments of Stephen- 
son in England having been successful. After 
some years of labor, his wish was gratified in 



54 BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES. 

seeing the Boston and Lowell Railroad opened for 
traffic in 1835. 

Mr. Jackson died in 1847. " The news of his 
death was received as a public calamity. The ex- 
pressions that spontaneously burst forth from 
every mouth were a most touching testimonial 
to his virtues, as much as to his ability. He had 
endowments morally as well as intellectually 
of a high order. The loftiest principles — not 
merely of integrity, but of honor — governed him 
in every transaction." 



SAMUEL LORENZO KNAPP. 
1783-1838. 

After graduating at Dartmouth College in 1804, 
Mr. Samuel Lorenzo Knapp studied law, and ob- 
tained an excellent rank among his professional 
brethren. He was for a time a member of the 
State Legislature. During the war with England 
in 1812, he commanded a regiment of militia. 
His literary works, now almost unknown, gave 
him considerable celebrity in his clay. His " Lives 
of Eminent Lawyers, Statesmen, and Men of Let- 
ters," published in 1821, are considered "a model 
of that species of composition ; " while his bio- 
graphical memoir of Archbishop Cheverus has 
been called " an elegant performance." M. Che- 



SIMON GREENLEAF. 55 

verus, who had been driven from France by the 
excesses of the Eevolution, came to America for 
refuge, and was, in 1810, made the first Catholic 
Bishop of Boston, where he won the esteem of the 
Protestants as well as the Catholics. Eecalled to 
his native land by Louis XVIIL, he became Arch- 
bishop of Bordeaux, and a peer of France under 
Charles X. Mr. Cushing, in the introduction to 
his account of the French Eevolution of 1830, 
speaks of the " pure and venerable Cheverus." 

Other works by Mr. Knapp are " Lectures on 
American Literature," and " Female Biography." 
In the latter work he claims that in Newbury- 
port " were probably established the first primary 
and infant schools that can be found in the annals 
of instruction. The Hon. Jonathan Jackson and 
the Eev. John Murray were instrumental in 
getting the town to establish these schools." 



SIMON GREENLEAF. 

1783-1853. 

As already mentioned, Mr. Simon Greenleaf 
belonged to a well-known family of Newbury, 
which had already produced several men of talent. 
He chose law as his profession ; and being ad- 
mitted to the Bar in 1806, rose rapidly in the 
ranks. "By unwearied industry he laid the foun- 
dations of his great legal learning." 



56 BIOGKAPHICAL SKETCHES. 

Upon the separation of Maine from Massachu- 
setts, Mr. Greenleaf was made Keporter of the 
Supreme Court of the new State, and his reports 
in nine volumes, from 1820 to 1832, "exhibit full 
proof of his industry and accuracy." In 1834 he 
was appointed to the Eoyall Professorship in the 
Harvard Law School, at the suggestion of Judge 
Story ; and at the death of that eminent jurist, 
was elected to fill his place, in 1846, in the Dane 
Professorship. In 1848 he was obliged to resign 
his chair on account of ill health, caused by too 
great application to his duties. 

A few quotations from his inaugural address in 
1834 will show the spirit which he breathed into 
his teachings : " In the science of law, as in the 
comparative anatomy of a sister profession, we 
best understand our own system of laws by com- 
paring it with those of other nations. . . . Man 
is to be studied in every period of his social exist- 
ence, from the savage to the civilized state. . . . 
In the walks of private life the character of an 
upright lawyer shines with mild but genial lustre. 
He concerns himself with the beginnings of con- 
troversies, not to inflame but to extinguish them. 
He feels that his first duties are to the community 
in which he lives, and whose peace he is bound 
to preserve. . . . The judiciary is the only barrier 
against the desolating flood of wild misrule and 
the encroachments of stern and relentless despot- 
ism. . . . American liberty can never be destroyed 



EEV. GARDINER SPRING. 57 

but by first destroying the independence of the ju- 
diciary and bringing its authority into contempt." 

It was said of Mr. Greenleaf that "as an in- 
structor he was greatly beloved, and his lectures 
and teachings were clear, distinct, and practical; 
as a counsellor he was clear, safe, and practical ; 
as a man he possessed a weight of character which 
insured for him the esteem of all who enjoyed his 
society, or came within the circle of his influence : 
affable, polite, courteous, frank, and liberal-minded, 
he secured the confidence of his fellow-citizens 
and neighbors, who sincerely mourned his loss as 
that of a good man." 

His best-known legal work is a " Treatise on 
the Law of Evidence," which is considered the 
standard work on the subject. " The beauty of 
his style and his correct expositions of law have 
placed him by the side of Blackstone and Kent." 



REV. GARDINER SPRING. 

1785-1873. 

The Eev. Samuel Spring, a graduate of the Col- 
lege of New Jersey in 1771, who accompanied 
Arnold's expedition to Canada as chaplain, and 
who upon retiring from the army in 1777, became 
pastor of a church in Newburyport, where he re- 
mained until his death, — a man of great influence 



58 BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES. 

and weight of character, and of considerable lit- 
erary ability, — was the father of the Kev. Dr. 
Gardiner Spring, born in 1785. 

After graduating at Yale College in 1805, Mr. 
Gardiner Spring commenced the study of the law, 
and was admitted to the Bar in 1808. He soon, 
however, turned his attention to theology, and 
after pursuing his studies at Andover, received a 
call to what is known among the Presbyterians 
as the " Brick Church," in New York, " where he 
remained unmoved by invitations to preside at 
Hamilton and Dartmouth Colleges, maintaining 
for over half a century a position as one of the 
most popular and esteemed divines of the city." 

His published works are numerous. Among 
those best known are " Obligations of the "World 
to the Bible," " The Power of the Pulpit," " Short 
Sermons for the People," and his " Personal Kenii- 
niscences." 

In 1820 he was invited to deliver a sermon 
before the New England Society of the State and 
City of New York, on December 22, the second 
centennial of the landing of the Pilgrims, in 
which he says : " With honest exultation be it said, 
there is no spot on the globe where the rights of 
conscience are more sacredly revered than in New 
England. There every man thinks for himself on 
subjects of the greatest moment." Towards the 
close of the same sermon he says : " Descendants 
of New England ! This is a day in which it 



JOSHUA COFFIN. 59 

becomes us with high exultation to commemorate 
the virtues of our ancestors ; and by our adher- 
ence to the principles and our attachment to the 
institutions which they have intrusted to our care, 
prove to the world how worthy we are to be 
called their sons." 



JOSHUA COFFIN. 
1792-1864. 

As an antiquary and genealogist Mr. Joshua 
Coffin became extensively known, and his " His- 
tory of Newbury," published in 1845, gave him 
considerable reputation. 

It is to be regretted that Mr. Coffin did not 
carry out his intention of publishing the lives of 
the Newbury people who have become distin- 
guished in the various vocations of life ; such a 
work would have been particularly interesting, as 
he had access to family papers, and knew much 
by tradition. 

Mr. Coffin was ardent in the cause of emancipa- 
tion, and was one of the original founders of the 
New England Anti-slavery Society in 1832, being 
the first Eecording Secretary, while Mr. Michael 
H. Simpson was the first Treasurer. In the pre- 
amble of the constitution of that Society the 
founders say : " We declare that we will not oper- 
ate on the existing relatious of society by other 



60 BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES. 

than peaceful and lawful means, and that we will 
o-ive no countenance to violence or insurrection." 

o 

After graduating at Dartmouth College in 1817, 
Mr. Coffin taught school for a time, and had 
among his pupils the poet Whittier, who wrote 
his poem entitled " To My Old Schoolmaster," as 
a token of respect to his teacher : — 

" Looking back to that far day 
And the primal lessons, feel 
Grateful smiles my lips unseal, 
As remembering thee, I blend 
Olden teacher, present friend, 
"Wise with antiquarian search 
In the scrolls of State and Church." 



CHARLES TOPPAN. 
1796-1874. 

Mr. Charles Toppan was a descendant of Abra- 
ham Toppan, one of the original proprietors of 
Newbury, and the progenitor of the numerous 
family, some branches of which have changed 
the name to Tappan. 

The life of Mr. Toppah was most intimately 
connected with the rise and development of bank- 
note engraving in the United States, which from 
small beginnings has become an important in- 
dustry of the country, making tributary to the 



CHAKLES TOPPAN. 61 

artistic excellence of the American bank-note 
engravers the Eussian Empire, Greece, Italy, Spain, 
and some of the Swiss cantons, Canada, and Mex- 
ico, the West India Islands, the States of South 
America, Australia, and the Empire of Japan. 

Having early developed great aptitude and love 
for art, and his youthful productions having been 
highly commended, some of which elicited the 
approbation of Monroe, then Secretary of State, 
he was invited in 1814 to enter the bank-note 
engraving house of Draper, Murray, & Fairman, 
established in Philadelphia. Applying himself 
with great diligence to his profession, he soon 
rose to a foremost rank in it, being noted for the 
accuracy of his work and the rapidity of his exe- 
cution. In 1819 he accompanied Messrs. Perkins 
and Fairman to Europe, as they had every expec- 
tation of obtaining the work of engraving the notes 
of the Bank of England, which had been counter- 
feited. In a letter to a member of his family he 
writes : " As yet nothing has been decided, but 
the prospects are so favorable as almost to assure 
us of success. Mr. Perkins dined a few days 
since with Sir Joseph Banks, who is President of 
the Bank Committee, and from the opinion he 
expressed with respect to the beauty, safety, and 
ingenuity of the specimens shown him, there is 
no doubt of his influence being exerted- in favor 
of their adoption. The specimens that have been 
presented by the English artists, and on which all 



62 BIOGKAPHICAL SKETCHES. 

their talent has been exerted, fall far short of the 
American in every respect, in the opinion of all 
who have seen both of them ; and I am pleased 
to say there does not appear the least jealousy or 
the least hesitation among the artists and citizens 
in acknowledging the superiority, and giving it as 
their wish that our plan should be adopted." 

After an absence in Europe of several years, 
during which time he witnessed the funeral ser- 
vices of George III., the coronation of George IV., 
and the rejoicings in Paris over the birth of the 
Count de Chambord, Mr. Toppan returned to 
the United States, and in 1828 recommenced his 
career as a bank-note engraver in Philadelphia, 
Mr. Danforth soon joining him, as Mr. Fairman 
was no longer living. For thirty years the firm, 
of which he was the head, maintained the highest 
rank for beauty and excellence of work until 1858, 
when the various bank-note engraving houses of 
the country were united under the name of the 
American Bank-Note Company, Mr. Toppan be- 
ing unanimously chosen the first president, as his 
qualifications eminently fitted him for the position. 
After fully organizing the new corporation, whose 
principal seat was in New York, with branches in 
Philadelphia, Boston, Cincinnati, New Orleans, 
and Montreal, he resigned the presidency in 1860. 

He was a member of various societies, and on 
terms of friendship with Irving, Bryant, Marsh, 
Sully, and other literati and artists. 



REV. BENJAMIN HALE. 63 

In his views he was broad and liberal ; consci- 
entious in the discharge of duty; courteous in 
manner; social and cheerful in disposition, and 
was very generous, especially to young artists, 
many of whom he befriended. Being an excel- 
lent judge of art, he gathered around him a choice 
collection of paintings. His love for the beauti- 
ful hi art and nature did not diminish with ad- 
vancing years, as only a few days before his 
decease he was busy with his pencil sketching 
the picturesque scenes in the neighborhood of 
Florence, Italy, where he died in 1874. 



REV. BENJAMIN HALE. 

1797-1863. 

Among the early settlers of Newbury was 
Thomas Hale, from whom was descended the 
Eev. Benjamin Hale. In 1814 he entered Dart- 
mouth College, where he remained, however, only 
a short time, then went to Bowdoin College, re- 
ceiving his degree of Bachelor of Arts there in 
1818. The next year he commenced his theo- 
logical studies at Andover, which were, however, 
interrupted by the offer of a tutorship of Natural 
Philosophy at Bowdoin. After occupying the 
tutorship for two years, he was chosen the head 
master of a lyceum at Gardiner, Maine, where 



64 BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES. 

he remained until his election in 1827 to the 
Professorship of Chemistry at Dartmouth College, 
a position he held until 1835. 

During his residence at Hanover he became 
a member of the Episcopal Church, leaving the 
ranks of the Church in which he had been edu- 
cated, and which was the governing power at the 
College. The feeling among the Trustees was so 
hostile to him on account of the change of his 
theological views that the Professorship of Chem- 
istry was merged into another professorship for 
the purpose of forcing him to resign. 

This bigoted proceeding has unfortunately had 
its parallel in other colleges of other denomina- 
tions, as the lesson of religious toleration and 
equality has as yet been only imperfectly learned 
Columbia College, which has fallen under the 
control of the Episcopal Church, conferred imme- 
diately the degree of Doctor of Divinity upon 
Mr. Hale, who the next year (1836) was made 
President of Geneva College, New York, after- 
wards named Hobart College, in honor of Bishop 
Hobart. 

The College was in almost a bankrupt condition 
when Dr. Hale was made its presiding officer- 
He applied himself immediately with great energy 
to establishing it on a firm basis, and after much 
toil and anxiety his efforts were crowned with 
success. In the midst of his labors, in 1852, he 
was obliged to go abroad for rest and recreation, 



EEV. BENJAMIN HALE. 65 

returning after a short absence with renewed 
strength. His health, however, yielded again to 
his severe labors, and in 1858 he resigned the 
presidency. 

In accepting his resignation, the Board of Trus- 
tees resolved " to record on their minutes the 
unanimous expression of their regret at its neces- 
sity, and their warm and cordial recognition of 
the fidelity, ability, and self-devotion with which 
he has administered the College ; of the sacrifices 
he has made in its behalf; of his persevering 
adherence to its interests and welfare in its dark- 
est hours ; of his success in elevating it to its 
present prosperity; and of the talent, suavity, 
zeal, and usefulness that have characterized his 
presidency." 

" His temperament was exceedingly genial, kind, 
and amiable. Patient and persevering, he pos- 
sessed an indomitable energy, and a mind ever 
ready for action." 

Hon. Andrew D. White, in speaking of his 
former teacher, says : " He was one of the most 
kindly, genial, and able instructors who ever 
blessed any institution of learning." 

In 1859 Dr. Hale returned to JSTewburyport, 
where he remained until his decease, in 1863. 



BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES. 



JACOB LITTLE. 
1797-1865. 

The father of Mr. Jacob Little, who bore the 
same Christian name as the son, was a prosperous 
merchant of Newburyport, and a descendant of 
one of the old settlers of the town. 

The son entered, at a very early age, the counting- 
house of Jacob Barker, a well-known merchant of 
New York, whose respect and confidence he won 
by his zeal and fidelity. Becoming a stock-broker, 
he displayed in his new sphere unwearied applica- 
tion, combined with the strictest integrity ; and by 
the year 1834 he was the acknowledged head of 
the financial world of New York, being called the 
" Napoleon of the Board," on account of his large 
transactions. 

During his long business career he met with 
disasters, and was obliged to suspend three times ; 
but after each reverse he paid his creditors in full, 
with interest. It was always said in Wall Street 
that the " suspended paper of Mr. Little was 
better than the checks of most merchants." So 
high was his reputation that his portrait has been 
placed in the New York Stock Exchange, — a gift 
of the Board of Brokers. 



THEOPHILUS PARSONS, JR. 67 

THEOPHILUS PARSONS, JR. 
1797-1882. 

Three years before Mr. Theophilus Parsons trans- 
ferred his home from Newburyport to Boston, the 
family was increased by the birth of a son, also 
named Theophilus, who received his degree of 
Bachelor of Arts at Harvard College in 1815, 
being noted as one of the most diligent students 
of the University. 

Soon after his graduation he wrote an article on 
the "Manners and Customs of India," which he 
offered to the "North American Eeview." The 
article was so clever that Professor Edward T. 
Channing, then editor of the magazine, could 
scarcely believe it was written by so young a 
man. Subsequently Mr. Parsons contributed sev- 
eral articles to the pages of the "Eeview," the 
most important being " Domestic Manners of the 
Romans," "Tendencies of Modern Science," and 
" Kent's Commentaries." 

To his legal studies he applied himself with the 
same diligence that he had displayed in his college 
course. He found in time that his overtaxed 
brain needed rest, and he was induced to take a 
voyage to Europe for recreation. Upon visiting 
Russia he was received with great kindness by 



68 BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES. 

the Czar, who offered him a government employ- 
ment. He, however, declined the flattering offer, 
and returned to the United States to resume the 
practice of his profession. 

His legal attainments were such' that in 1847 
he was appointed to the Dane Professorship in the 
Harvard Law School, a position which he filled 
with great credit until his resignation in 1870. 
His declining years were passed in Cambridge, 
where his decease took place in 1882. 

His legal works are well known, particularly 
his book on " Contracts," which is a standard 
work in the legal profession, the "Law of Part- 
nership," and " Marine Insurance and General 
Average." He also wrote upon the religious doc- 
trines of Swedenborg, to which faith he belonged. 



WILLIAM WHEELWRIGHT. 
1798-1873. 

Among the many examples of great energy, 
perseverance, and integrity of character that Xew- 
buryport has sent into the world, is conspicuous 
the name of William Wheelwright. By force of 
will he overcame many obstacles, and accom- 
plished tasks that were considered impracticable. 

Being wrecked on the coast of South America 
when a young man, he made that continent his 
home for many years. To him belongs the prin- 



WILLIAM WHEELWRIGHT. 69 

cipal merit of bringing the South Americans into 
the current of the modern world. He was the 
first to introduce steam, which brought South 
America into closer connection with Europe and 
the United States. He induced the capitalists of 
England to foster South American commerce by 
establishing railways, improving the harbors, and 
building water and gas works. 

In the accomplishment of these beneficial ends 
he shunned no fatigue or hardship. 

So highly was he esteemed for his integrity, 
his courtesy of manner, and his strict impartiality 
in the domestic conflicts of South America, that 
his portrait was placed in the Exchange at Val- 
paraiso by his friends and admirers, and subse- 
quently a bronze statue of him was erected in the 
Square of the same city, — a gift of the citizens. 

Mr. Alberdi, formerly the minister from the 
Argentine Republic to England and France, in his 
memoir of Mr. Wheelwright speaks of him in 
terms of the highest praise, saying that " the name 
and personality of Wheelwright symbolize mod- 
ern industry, in its conflict with the effete colonial 
system represented by old Castilians disguised in 
modern fashionable attire." 

The difficulties of the tasks accomplished by 
Mr. Wheelwright can only be realized by those 
who know what was the general apathy of the 
countries in which and for which he labored. 

He died in London in 1873. 



70 BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES. 

CALEB CUSHING. 
1800-1879. 

The Cushing family, many members of which 
have become conspicuous in public life, was 
among the first settlers of Hingham, one branch 
of it coming in early times to Salisbury, where 
Mr. Caleb Gushing was born at the beginning of 
the century, about two years before his father, Mr. 
John N. Cushing, a descendant of the Eev. Caleb 
Cushing and of the celebrated Rev. John Cotton, 
moved to Newburyport, on the opposite side of 
the Eiver Merrimac, where he became a prosper- 
ous merchant. 

After graduating at Harvard College in 1817, 
with very high honors, notwithstanding his youth, 
Mr. Cushing began the study of law in Cambridge 
as a resident graduate, remaining, however, only 
one year, and then entering the office of Mr. Eben- 
ezer Moseley of Newburyport. 

Even in his college course he had given marks 
of the wide grasp of his mind, ranging from poetry 
to the exact sciences, of his great versatility, 
and of his unquenchable ardor in the pursuit of 
knowledge. 

In 1819 he delivered by invitation an original 
poem before the Phi Beta Kappa Society of Cam- 



CALEB CUSHING. 71 

bridge, and the next year wrote for the " North 
American Eeview " a learned article on the Civil 
Law, showing thorough and conscientious work. 
In it he exhorts the legal profession to turn their 
attention to the Eonian law, which had been too 
much neglected, saying, " The continental law 
ought to be made an important — it might almost 
be said the most important — branch of elementary 
legal study." This was followed by an article on 
Coke, showing an equally extensive knowledge of 
the English common law. When twenty-one, he 
translated Pothier's " Maritime Contracts," adding 
to the translation a life of that distinguished French 
jurist. Mr. Wheaton " availed himself of the 
publication of Mr. Cushing's translation of Pothier 
to aid in making his countrymen acquainted with 
the merits of that most learned lawyer." 

In 1820 and 1821 he was Tutor of Mathe- 
matics and Natural Philosophy in Harvard Uni- 
versity, when Ticknor and Everett were professors 
in the College, and Eufus Choate was a student 
in the Cambridge Law School. 

In 1824 he married the beautiful and accom- 
plished daughter of Judge Wilde, whose interest- 
ing "Letters Descriptive of Public Monuments, 
Scenery, and Manners in France and Spain," were 
published in 1832. In this account of her travels 
she speaks of the kindness with which she and 
Mr. dishing were received (in 1829) by General 
Lafayette, who escorted them in his carriage from 



72 BIOGEAPHICAL SKETCHES. 

Paris to his country place of La Grange. " Never 
did I imagine a scene of more unaffected harmony 
and domestic love, more unbounded kindness and 
hospitality, than this noble mansion presents." 

Mr. Cushing entered public life early, being 
only twenty-five when he became a member of 
the General Court. From that time until his 
death, — a period of more than fifty years, — he 
was one of the conspicuous figures of the country, 
and became " one of the most remarkable men of 
the nineteenth century." 

In 1826 he published a " Summary of the Prac- 
tical Principles of Political Economy," showing 
that he was conversant with the best writers on 
that science. The same year his eulogy on Adams 
and Jefferson was delivered, and his " History of 
Newburyport " appeared, which preceded Mr. Cof- 
fin's nearly twenty years. 

In addition to his legal pursuits, he wrote many 
articles for the "North American Eeview," em- 
bracing a great variety of topics. His article on 
" Botany of the United States " evinces a mastery 
of the subject, which had been one of his favorite 
studies ; while his historical papers, " Ancient and 
Modern History," "Columbus," "Vespucci," "The 
Free Cities of Flanders," " The Ancient History of 
the Netherlands," and the "Legal Condition of 
Women," in ancient and modern times, show that 
his acquaintance with history was equal to his 
knowledge of law. 



CALEB CUSIIING. 73 

Having the power to adapt his style to his sub- 
ject, some of his writings are almost poetical, 
while others are precise, clear, and even severe. 
His " Beminiscences of Spain " are full of imagi- 
nation, being almost entirely a series of romantic 
stories, while his history of the French Kevolution 
of 1830, giving its causes and immediate results, is 
picturesque. In that work, published in 1833, 
he predicted the national unity of Italy and Ger- 
many, saying : " The Germans, like the Italians, 
have now gained a definite aim, and they are 
moving toward it slowly but surely; and that 
aim is the reconstruction of Germany, — a Ger- 
many of popular rights and constitutional powers, 
— a Germany of one great nation, capable of 
playing its part in the affairs of Europe and in 
the work of European civilization. ... It needs 
only national institutions to revive the national 
glory of Italy." 

The "Social Condition of Women," written in 
1836, gives a good idea of the style of many of his 
magazine articles, which were not confined to the 
"North American Eeview." Contrasting women 
in pagan with those in Christian countries, he 
writes : " Throughout the New Testament she is 
contemplated as a spiritual and immortal being, 
the equal partaker with man of all the offices of 
religion here and all its divine aspirations here- 
after. We listen to prayer and exhortation within 
the same hcly walls of God's temple; we kneel in 



74 BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES. 

supplication to the same consecrated altar; chil- 
dren are admitted into the visible church of Christ 
at the same baptismal fount ; we mutually plight 
our faith under the solemn sanction and obser- 
vances of a common religion ; and when the dear- 
est bonds of blood or affection are sundered by 
death, there is left us the one admirable solace of 
sorrow, that the sainted spirit of the wife, sister, 
daughter we may have lost, has winged its flight 
upward to rest forever in the bosom of the Chris- 
tian's God." 

His oration before the literary societies of Am- 
herst College in 1836 was a scholarly perform- 
ance, urging young men to take their part in 
public life : " We have many virtuous men among 
us, and wise, too, who sit with folded arms, de- 
ploring the evils of the time. I say to all such 
in public, as I say in private, Yours is but a 
timid virtue, a barren wisdom. Instead of idly 
complaining that affairs go wrong, bestir your- 
selves to make them straight. Feel that you 
have public as well as private duties." One of 
the similes he employed in the same address is 
very striking : " When Alexander of Macedon had 
subdued the great Persian and Macedonian em- 
pire, and borne his victorious arms to the utter- 
most shores of Asia, — when, lamenting that no 
second world remained for him to conquer, he re- 
turned to Babylon, drunk with pride and power, 
and master of all the riches of the East, — the 



CALEB CUSHING. 75 

wildest projects of insane adulation were continu- 
ally poured into his ears. None was more stu- 
pendous than that of the architect Stasicrates. 
There stretches out into the iEgean Sea the vast 
promontory of Mount Athos, which beetles over 
the mariner as he sails past, and at sundown pro- 
jects its huge shadow leagues off upon the hills of 
Lemnos, darkening over land and sea like a plane- 
tary eclipse. Stasicrates proposed to carve Mount 
Athos into a colossal statue of Alexander, that 
should hold a city of ten thousand inhabitants in 
its left hand, and in its right a horn of plenty 
sending forth a deep river into the iEgean Sea. 
What the bold Greek conceived, — a project ap- 
parently beyond the reach of human agency, ex- 
travagant, gigantic, Titan ian, — even this much, 
in its effects upon the physical exterior and the 
moral constitution of the world, has been accom- 
plished by the intellect of man. Out of the very 
face of the primeval wilderness he has raised up 
a form, lofty and majestic in its proportions ; cul- 
tured fields, populous towns, imperial States are 
in the palm of its hand; it pours out a perennial 
stream of prosperity and abundance, to fertilize 
and enrich the earth ; it is the sublime personifi- 
cation of that moral and social order, that organi- 
zation of physical strength, animated by a great 
moral and intellectual purpose, which constitutes 
the civilization of Christendom." 

In 1834, the same year in which he delivered 



76 BIOGEAPHICAL SKETCHES. 

an able and interesting eulogy on Lafayette, he 
was elected to Congress, where he soon became a 
conspicuous member. " Mr. Webster said, so re- 
ports Kev. Dr. Lothrop, in speaking of his ability 
and wonderful powers of seizing knowledge, that 
Mr. Cushing had not been six weeks in Congress 
before he was acknowledged to be the highest 
authority on what had been the legislation upon 
any given subject." His speeches were forcible 
and sometimes impassioned, and always showed a 
complete knowledge of the subject he was treat- 
ing. In political views he followed Webster, for 
whom he had a high admiration, believing, with him 
and Clay and Channing, that slavery was a moral 
and a political wrong, but that the States alone, by 
the Constitutional Compact, which was a meas- 
ure of compromise, had power over their domestic 
relations. He opposed strongly the disunion 
sentiment in the North and the South, and his 
efforts were constantly directed to a reconciliation 
of the conflicting factions. Towards the close of 
his life he wrote : " Every act of my political life, 
in whatever relation of parties, was governed by 
the single dominant purpose of aiming to preserve 
the threatened integrity of the Union." 

In Congress he said, " Our settled convictions of 
right and wrong lead us to condemn slavery as a 
great moral and political evil, and to desire its 
cessation, though our fealty to the Constitution 
withholds us from attempting any direct interfer- 



CALEB CUSHING. 77 

ence with it. ... I find myself in the singular 
predicament of addressing to the ultra friends of 
liberty at home and the ultra friends of slavery 
here the same arguments of moderation." He was 
as firmly opposed to the doctrine of secession, — 
which he foresaw would lead to civil war if car- 
ried out, — as he was to the fiery zeal of the 
abolitionists, who proposed no remedy except im- 
mediate emancipation without compensation, and 
who preached disunion. He considered the govern- 
ment national and perpetual, possessing supreme 
authority for executing the powers intrusted to 
it; and for the purpose of carrying out those 
powers he was in favor of the maintenance of an 
adequate military and naval force. 

His views underwent no change during his long 
political career, and he hoped constantly that the 
Union would be preserved peacefully, dreading 
the calamities of an armed contest. As president 
of the Charleston Convention in 1860, at the 
opening of the dreadful drama of the Civil War, 
he urged in emphatic language the necessity of 
preserving the Union and the Constitution. 

He was independent and fearless in speech, and 
never hesitated to defend New England against 
the assaults and taunts of the extremists of the 
South. In his speech on the " Eight of Petition " 
in 1836, while presenting petitions for the aboli- 
tion of slavery in the District of Columbia, he 
says: "The right of petition is not a privilege 



78 BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES. 

conferred by the Constitution. It is recognized 
as a pre-existing right already possessed by the 
people, which they still reserve to themselves, 
and which Congress shall not so much as touch 
with the weight of a finger. ... To understand 
its nature and extent we must therefore look 
beyond and behind the Constitution into the 
anterior political history of the country. ... If 
there be any plausible reason for supposing that 
we have the right to legislate on the slave inter- 
ests of the District of Columbia, you cannot put 
down the investigation of the subject out-of-doors 
by refusing to receive petitions. . . . The aboli- 
tionists have a right to their opinions, and a right 
to express their opinions in all constitutional 
modes." 

His defence of John Quincy Adams in 1837, 
when it was proposed in the House of Representa- 
tives to censure the Ex-President, was vigorous 
and impassioned : " Eminent as he is by reason 
of his long public services and the exalted posi- 
tions he has held, he is yet more eminent for 
his intellectual superiority ; his character no 
longer belongs to his State or his country, but to 
the history of civilization and of liberty. ... Do 
members of the South conceive they are to have 
the privilege of speech exclusively to themselves ? 
If so, it is time they should awake from their 
self-delusion. . . . Sir, I might also say, with my 
colleague (Mr. Lincoln), that I am of the frigid 



CALEB CUSHING. 79 

North. But let not gentlemen mistake us, nor 
imagine that because we choose to reason we 
cannot feel. I beg leave to assure them that we 
of the North could pour forth declamation as 
little to the purpose as others do, if it comported 
with our notions of good taste or of good sense. 
If we are less irritable than some of those with 
whom we are associated here, it is not that in a 
just quarrel we are less profoundly moved. Bred 
in the perpetual inculcation of habits of order and 
self-control, we are accustomed to think that in 
questions like the present, involving the first 
principles of civil liberty and the dearest rights of 
mankind, passionate invective, rash menace, and 
random exclamation are poor substitutes for rea- 
son and argument. ... I have been deeply sen- 
sible to the wrongs heaped on the North in the 
course of this debate. I have marked the cries 
of violence with which this hall has continually 
rung. I mean to vindicate unflinchingly the rights 
of my constituents and the fame of my fore- 
fathers. ... I cannot sit tamely by, in humble, 
acquiescent silence, when reflections which I 
know to be unjust are cast on the faith and 
honor of Massachusetts. ... I will not be silent 
when I hear her patriotism or her truth ques- 
tioned with so much as a whisper of detraction. 
Living I will defend her, dying I would pause in 
my last expiring breath to utter a prayer of fond 
remembrance for my native New England." 



80 BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES. 

After giving, in 1838, in his speech upon the 
French claims, a clear historical exposition of the 
whole subject, he terminates with these words: 
" The United States has discharged or stands 
ready to discharge her whole acknowledged pub- 
lic debt. Now is the auspicious moment, there- 
fore, to show that as she is resolute to exact 
justice of others, so she is ready to render it her- 
self, in satisfying this, which, being in fact the 
equivalent of the aid we received from France, is 
among the last outstanding of the great pecuniary 
obligations of the Revolution." 

He demanded also, in his remarks on the Ind- 
ian Department, that the Government should ex- 
ercise justice towards the original possessors of the 
soil : " Dictates of duty in this matter are not 
less imperative than arguments of policy. They 
have sunk to what they are, if not by us, yet 
through us. We have assumed the guardianship 
of them, and have pledged ourselves by stipulation 
after stipulation to watch over their welfare. I 
invoke the faith of treaties, I appeal to the honor 
of the nation, I demand of it truth and justice, if 
there be any sense of right in civilized communi- 
ties, that we act decidedly and promptly in the 
execution of some well-digested plan for the bene- 
fit of the Indians subject to our authority. Let 
us not speak to them only as conquerors and in 
the language of relentless rigor ; but to the vigor 
that shall overawe and control, conjoin the justice 



CALEB CUSHING. 81 

that shall command respect, and the clemency 
that shall conciliate affection." 

In 1839., in a speech at Springfield, he says: 
" There may be civil wars ; there may come a dis- 
solution of the Union ; " but " the people of the 
United States possess recuperative energies in 
their elastic habits of mind and character, in the 
freedom of their institutions, in the vast resources 
of the country, and in the separate rights and 
domestic policy of each State, to rise superior to 
all the blunders or misdeeds of the federal 
government." 

Speaking of the West at one time, he said : 
"What is the power of the old thirteen States 
north or south, compared with that of the mighty 
West ? There is the seat of empire, and there is 
the hand of imperial power." 

When President Tyler in 1841 disappointed 
the hopes of the Whigs by vetoing the Bank Bill, 
Mr. Cushing exerted himself to prevent a disrup- 
tion of the Whig party, which held the reins of 
power, arguing that although the President dif- 
fered from them on one point, yet on other essen- 
tial points he was in harmony with them. " We 
might attempt to do this [proscribe the President] 
if we chose, but all we should accomplish in such 
an attempt would be the suicidal destruction of 
our own party and the cowardly abandonment of 
the power which the people of the United States 
have placed in our hands. . . . Shall we not allow 



82 BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES. 

to the President of the United States, as the 
actual chief of the party and the constitutional 
head of the government, the right of conscien- 
tious judgment ? . . . The people have placed us 
in power for the purification and reform of the 
government, and the promotion of the manifold 
interests of the Union. It is for us to decide 
whether we will prove recreant to the trust," and 
" whether, in entering upon a parricidal warfare 
against our own chief and the head of our own 
administration, we will place an impassable gulf 
between him and us." 

The breach could not be healed, and Mr. Gush- 
ing thought it his duty to stand by the President, 
as did also Mr. Webster, who continued in his 
post as Secretary of State. From this time Mr. 
Gushing gradually fell into the ranks of the Dem- 
ocratic party, although always independent in his 
views, as he had been when associated with the 
Whigs. "I choose to keep the direction of my 
conduct in my own hands, as the unshackled 
arbiter of my own destiny. I feel this to be my 
bounden duty; for I foresee that the time is 
likely enough to come, and in my day, if the ordi- 
nary term of human life should be spared me, 
when there will be no want of occupation for any 
man who would command himself amid the sur- 
rounding strife." 

His debates on financial measures having been 
able, he was nominated in 1843 as Secretary of 



CALEB CUSHING. 83 

the Treasury, but was rejected by the Senate. 
The same year he was appointed Commissioner to 
China, being eminently qualified for the position, 
as his knowledge of China, its literature, and its 
language, was something remarkable. He was 
able, it is said, to converse in that difficult lan- 
guage. Mr. Sumner writes : " Cushing has made 
a grammar of the Manchu language, which he pro- 
poses to publish, — whether in English or Latin 
he has not determined. You know he studied 
diligently the old Tartar dialect, that he might 
salute the Emperor in his court language." Be- 
ing the first envoy from the United States to 
the Celestial Empire, a naval squadron was or- 
dered to escort him to his destination. The 
treaty concluded by him the next year, when 
Calhoun had taken the place of "Webster as Sec- 
retary of State, has been considered the best ever 
made with an Oriental and pagan nation. In it 
he not only upheld the dignity of the govern- 
ment he represented, treating the Chinese officials 
on terms of equality, but also securing the prin- 
ciple of exterritoriality of American citizens to 
the fullest extent. He accomplished by peaceful 
means more than England had obtained by hostile 
measures. 

When the war with Mexico broke out in 1846, 
Mr. Cushing, although he had been opposed to 
the annexation of Texas, expressed the view in 
the State Legislature that, " as war was constitu- 



84 BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES. 

feionally established through the act of both 
houses of Congress, and the Governor having 
complied with the Constitutional request of the 
President and having taken the necessary steps to 
raise a regiment, the State was already com- 
mitted ; and if we should repudiate what has been 
done, what would be the alternative ? Would not 
a refusal to send the troops be a nullification ? 
. . . Almost all the cpuestions which have agi- 
tated the United States have arisen from a 
conflict of Federal and State interests. South 
Carolina and Massachusetts, both pre-eminent in 
wealth and in intelligence, have also been pre- 
eminent in resistance to the federal government. 
South Carolina nullified the tax laws ; Massachu- 
setts nullified the war power." 

The Legislature having refused to vote the sum 
of twenty thousand dollars for the regiment, Mr. 
Cushing contributed that amount from his private 
fortune. Being appointed to the command of the 
regiment, he accepted the position, and entered 
upon his military duties with the same degree of 
thoroughness that he displayed in every sphere of 
action. After remaining a short time with Gen- 
eral Taylor on the Bio Grande, he was transferred 
to Vera Cruz, where he was detained by his mili- 
tary duties during the advance of the army upon 
the City of Mexico. He had, therefore, no oppor- 
tunity of distinguishing himself on the field. 
A fellow-oflicer writes : " His prompt discharge 



CALEB CUSHING. 85 

of every known duty, and his amiability as an 
officer and companion, have endeared him to all 
those with whom the fortune of war has placed 
him." He was promoted, in 1847, to the rank of 
brigadier-general, and while still absent from 
home was nominated by the Democrats as can- 
didate for the governorship of the State, but was 
defeated. 

When Newburyport was incorporated as a city, 
Mr. Cushing became its first mayor, in 1851. 
The next year he was appointed a Justice of the 
Supreme Court of the State, taking his seat at the 
September term ; but scarcely had he become ac- 
customed to his new duties when he was selected 
in 1853 by President Pierce — a companion-in- 
arms in the Mexican war — to the cabinet position 
of Attorney-General, which he retained four years. 
In the cabinet, associated with him, were Jeffer- 
son Davis as Secretary of War — a fellow-soldier 
in Mexico — and the able statesman Governor 
Marcy. The duties of that high and responsible 
position, which were increased by "transferring 
to that Department pardons, legal appointments, 
and such legal correspondence of any of the 
Departments as its head might see fit, . . . were 
never more thoroughly and ably performed than 
by Mr. Cushing." Mr. William Beach Lawrence, 
no inferior authority, who quotes in his excellent 
edition of Wheaton Mr. Cushing's opinions con- 
stantly, says : " The opinions of Attorney-General 



86 BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES. 

Cushing, contained in three volumes, constitute in 
themselves a valuable body of international law." 
In these opinions Mr. Cushing shows his familiar- 
ity with municipal, admiralty, constitutional, and 
international law, with continental law and deci- 
sions, and great historical research. His opinions, 
which are in their nature judicial, being answers 
to questions in regard to the existing laws, are 
exhaustive, and expressed in precise language and 
in a judicial spirit. The most important are 
upon the " Jurisdiction of Federal and State 
Courts," in which he says : " The courts of the 
United States are the rightful judges of their own 
jurisdiction;" upon the " Eight of Expatriation," 
in which he says : " The idea that citizenship or 
the loss of it cannot be defined by Congress is one 
of the lingering prejudices of the common law ; " 
upon the " Relation of the President to the Exec- 
utive Departments ; " upon the " Office and Duty 
of the Attorney-General," in which he gives a 
clear exposition of that office as a branch of the 
executive administration of the government; 
upon the "Civil Responsibility of the Army;" 
upon the " Nature of Martial Law," in which he 
says that " under the Constitution of the United 
States the power to suspend the Habeas Corpus 
Act belongs exclusively to Congress;" upon 
" Belligerent Asylum ; " upon the " Functions of 
Consuls ; " and upon " Foreign Enlistments," in 
which he says : " A foreign minister who engages 



CALEB CUSHING. 87 

in the enlistment of troops here for his govern- 
ment is subject to be summarily expelled from 
the country, or, after demand of recall, dismissed 
by the President." His final communication to 
the President upon the enlistment of troops in 
America by the English authorities during the 
Crimean war is a very forcible document, in which 
he maintains the dignity and honor of the na- 
tional government in no uncertain language : 
" As to Mr. Crampton [British Minister], he also 
could have offered his testimony if he had pleased. 
If he suggest that considerations of diplomatic 
dignity would prevent this, the reply is, that con- 
siderations of diplomatic dignity should have pre- 
vented his engaging, in association with persons 
now said by him to be of equivocal character, in 
the systematic violation, for a period of nearly six 
months, of the municipal law of the United 
States." In another opinion he speaks of the 
defects of the English law, saying : " The English 
are prone to criticise the barbarism of the exist- 
ing law of some of the continental states of 
Europe. Their own system is not less barbarous, 
unphilosophical, and fit for reparation." 

At the Charleston Democratic Convention in 
1860, for nominating a President and Vice-Presi- 
dent, Mr. Cushing, being a delegate from Massa- 
chusetts, was chosen the presiding officer. An 
eye-witness writes : " The Convention is most for- 
tunate in having so excellent a presiding officer. 



88 BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES. 

Mr. Cushing's head is wonderfully clear, and his 
knowledge of parliamentary law and the rules of 
the House of Representatives perfect. . . . His 
voice is clear, musical, and powerful ; every syl- 
lable of his speech was heard in every part of the 
house." 

The passions of this Convention, as is well 
known, were too much excited to be controlled 
by even the strong hand of Mr. Gushing. He 
pleaded for moderation, saying that " not merely 
the future of the great Constitutional party which 
you represent, but the fortunes of the Constitution 
also, are at stake on the acts of this Convention. . . . 
The mission of the Democratic party is to rec- 
oncile popular freedom with constitutional order ; 
to maintain the sacred reserved rights of the 
sovereign States; to stand, in a word, the per- 
petual sentinels on the outposts of the Constitu- 
tion." The same eye-witness, Mr. Halstead, writes : 
" This speech was applauded by all but the extreme 
pro-slavery wing of the Convention." Upon ad- 
journing to meet in Baltimore, Mr. Cushing said, 
" I pray you, gentlemen, in your return to your 
constituents and to the bosoms of your families, 
to take with you as your guiding thought the sen- 
timent of the Constitution and the Union. ... I 
will not believe that the noble work of our fathers 
is to be shattered into fragments, . . . this great 
Republic to be but a name, — a history of a 
mighty people once existing, but existing no 



CALEB CUSHING. 89 

longer save as a shadowy memory, or as a monu- 
mental ruin by the side of the pathway of time." 

Upon reassembling at Baltimore, and the ma- 
jority of States having withdrawn from the Con- 
vention, Mr. dishing felt it his duty to resign the 
chairmanship. " I came here prepared, regardless 
of all personal preferences, cordially to support 
the nominations of this Convention, whosoever they 
might be. ... I was deeply sensible of the diffi- 
culties, general and personal, looming up in the 
future to environ my path." 

The majority of the Massachusetts delegation 
having decided to join the rival Convention, the 
majority of States being there represented, Mr. 
Cushing was made the Chairman of that Con- 
vention, which nominated Breckenridge for the 
Presidency. 

Events moved on rapidly, but before the ordi- 
nance of secession was passed by South Carolina, 
President Buchanan, hoping to stop or retard the 
movement until Congress, then in session, could 
act, and the Union sentiment, which was still 
strong in many parts of the South, could be 
evoked and organized, sent in December, 1860, 
Mr. Cushing on a mission to Governor Pickens, 
but without success. In the letter of credence, 
Buchanan writes, " I need scarcely add that I 
entertain full confidence in his integrity, ability, 
and prudence." 

As soon as the South began the war against 



90 BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES. 

the North, which Mr. Cushing had foretold would 
be suicidal to them, he offered immediately (April, 
1861) his services in support of the Union, " in 
any capacity -in which it may be possible for me 
to contribute to the public weal in the present 
critical emergency." 

As member of the State Legislature in 1862, 
he said, " The country stands upon a yawning gulf, 
and this Commonwealth is called upon and will 
voluntarily do her full share in the great work. . . . 
I repeat, 1 could assent to it [a pending bill] with 
my eyes closed, if it did but tend in any degree 
to encourage and strengthen the soldiers in the 
service of the United States." 

At another time he said: "Our country, with 
all its sectional diversity of views and feelings, is 
one. It is one in the rich, manly, vigorous, ex- 
pressive language we speak, which is become the 
vernacular tongue, as it were, of parliamentary 
eloquence, the very dialect of Constitutional 
freedom. It is one in the fame of our fathers 
and in the historical reminiscences which belong 
to us as a nation. ... It is one in the substantial 
basis of our manners, in the warp at least of which 
the web is woven." 

When Mason and Slidell, the Southern envoys, 
were seized on the high seas by Captain Wilkes, 
Mr. Cushing gave it as his opinion that they were 
liable to seizure according to English precedents. 
" Mr. Cushinu was confidential adviser to different 



CALEB CUSHING. 91 

administrations, and in the most critical times 
through which the government was passing. Dur- 
ing that period his services were invaluable. 
Their history is yet to be written." 

In 1866 he was appointed a commissioner to 
codify the laws of the United States, and in 1868 
was sent to Bogota on a diplomatic mission. In 
1871 he was selected as the senior counsel of 
the United States for the Alabama Claims. For 
this position no one in the country was as well 
prepared. Mr. Gushing had been the mover, in 
1838, of a bill to meet the troubles existing in 
Canada, which became a temporary law, " to seize 
any vessel or vehicle and all arms or munitions 
of war .... where the character of the vessel or 
the quantity of v arms and munitions or other 
circumstances shall furnish probable cause to 
believe," that they are to be used for hostile 
purposes against a nation with which we are at 
peace. He was familiar with all the past troubles 
and negotiations with England, and was counsel 
for the United States in 1868, before the British 
and American joint Commission, in the matter of 
the Hudson Bay Company's Claims. His brief in 
the case of Suchet Mauran against several insur- 
ance companies, in 1867, was such a full exposition 
of the rights and duties of neutrals and of bellig- 
erents, that Mr. Sumner placed it, with many 
other pamphlets by Mr. Cushing, in the library 
of Harvard College; "according to principles of 



92 BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES. 

public law it is permissible to a government, in its 
dealings with a territorial rebellion and in war de- 
facto, to exercise belligerent rights without impair- 
ing in any degree the rights of sovereignty." 

Before the Tribunal of Arbitration at Geneva, 
Mr. Gushing and his colleagues, Mr. AYaite and 
Mr. Evarts, were eminently successful. Mr. 
Cushing's excellent knowledge of French assisted 
him materially, as that was the language of the 
Tribunal. Mr. Hamilton Fish, Secretary of State, 
says : " To him, as the leading counsel before the 
Tribunal at Geneva, the country is indebted for 
the comprehensible presentation of its case, result- 
ing in the verdict there obtained. His studies 
extended beyond the municipal laws of his own 
country ; his knowledge of the law of nations and 
his familiarity with the languages and the in- 
stitutions of other countries enabled him to hold 
intercourse with, and to impress himself and the 
points and the logic of the American case upon, 
those to whom the English language was not 
familiar. His argument before the Tribunal it 
was, which, delivered in a language understood by 
and familiar to each of the arbitrators, especially 
the three not named by either of the parties liti- 
gant, brought the law and the facts on which 
rested the American case, to the intelligence of 
the entire Court." Chief- Justice Waite said : " It 
was my fortune to be associated with Mr. Gushing 
before the Tribunal of Arbitration at Geneva, and 



CALEB CUSHING. 93 

I should be false to my own feelings, if I failed 
to record an expression of gratitude for the kind- 
ness and encouragement I received at his hands 
during all the time we were together. He was 
always just towards his juniors, and on that occa- 
sion he laid open his vast storehouse of knowl- 
edge for the free use of us all." 

Mr. Ciishing published, in 1873, the complete 
history of the arbitration in his " Treaty of Wash- 
ington." " The negotiations were to illustrate the 
eternal truth that out of the differences of nations 
competent statesmen evolve peace ; and that it is 
only by the incompetency of statesmen of one side 
or the other — that is, their ignorance, their pas- 
sion, their prejudice, their want of forecast, or 
their wilfully aggressive ambition — that the un- 
speakable calamities of war are ever thrust on 
the suffering world." 

The rebuke administered by Mr. Cushing to 
Sir Alexander Cockburn, Lord Chief-Justice of 
England, the British arbitrator, was deserved. 
He refused to sign the award against Great Bri- 
tain at the last sitting of the Tribunal, September 
14, 1S72 ; and in the words of Mr. Cushing, "The 
instant Count Sclopis (the President of the Tri- 
bunal) closed, and before the sound of his last 
words had died on the ear, Sir Alexander Cock- 
burn snatched up his hat, and without participa- 
ting in the exchange of leave-takings around him, 
without a word or sign of recognition for an}' of 



94 BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES. 

his colleagues, rushed to the door and disap- 
peared. ... It was one of those acts of dis- 
courtesy, which shock so much when they occur, 
that we feel relieved by the disappearance of the 
perpetrator." 

After the death of Mr. Chase in 1873, Mr. 
dishing was nominated by General Grant to the 
position of Chief-Justice of the Supreme Court of 
the United States; but some opposition to the 
confirmation, caused by political jealousies and 
enmities, manifesting itself in the Senate, he re- 
quested (January, 1874) the President to withdraw 
his name. Mr. Gushing would have adorned that 
exalted position. " His capacity and juridical 
learning no one ventured to question," writes Mr. 
Tuttle after Mr. Cushing's death, when partisan 
spirit had been partially allayed. 

In 1874 he was appointed Minister to Spain, 
the relations between our government and that 
country being in a critical condition, on account 
of the Cuban troubles. His knowledge of the 
Spanish language, which he spoke with fluency, 
was of great advantage to him. He was com- 
pletely successful in his negotiations, " discharging 
his duties with ability and fidelity, and to the 
entire satisfaction of the appointing power, and 
also of the country." By the treaty of 1877, an 
indemnity was secured for losses sustained by 
American citizens, and the principle of extradition 
fully established. 



CALEB CUSHING. 95 

Eesigning his position after the conclusion of 
the treaty, he returned to Newburyport, where, in 
the autumn, he delivered a speech at the organi- 
zation of the Historical Society, which was the 
last he ever made. It seemed fitting that his 
speech on that occasion should be the principal 
one, as he had delivered more than forty years 
before, in 1835, the oration at the two hundredth 
anniversary of the settlement of the town. He 
continued to reside in his large, old-fashioned man- 
sion until his death, in January, 1879. In all 
the troubles and triumphs of his long and busy 
life, the people of Newburyport stood by him 
steadfastly, and it seems that Mr. Cushing always 
felt that he could rely upon their sympathy and 
kindness. 

The funeral services, under the auspices of the 
City Government, Mr. J. J. Currier being mayor, 
were impressive. An able eulogy was pronounced 
by Hon. George B. Loring, who spoke of Mr. 
Cushing as being "an authority with every ad- 
ministration from Pierce's to Grant's on interna- 
tional law ; he was recognized as an admirable 
classical and belles-lettres scholar; his speeches 
in legislative debate were learned and exhaustive ; 
his occasional addresses were eloquent and com- 
prehensive; and his power as a writer led the 
literary world to regret deeply that he left behind 
him so few books and such circumscribed author- 
ship." Mr. Tuttle said : " Such was the great 



96 BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES. 

versatility of his talents, that he could master with 
equal facility any subject. I know of no subject 
of intellectual contemplation that lay outside of 
the range of his meditations and studies. The 
late President Pierce told me that Mr. Cushing 
could have filled any place in his Cabinet with as 
much ability and reputation as he did that of 
Attorney-General, and that his eye ranged over 
all the affairs of the government." Mr. Sumner 
used to say that " he had never met, at home or 
abroad, with any one so full of knowledge as 
Caleb Cushing." 

Attorney-General Devens remarked : " In pri- 
vate character and in social intercourse Mr. Cush- 
ing was most attractive. His rare powers of 
conversation and his large and well-digested 
stores of learning made him a fascinating com- 
panion to all who listened to him, while his 
readiness and cordial desire to serve others by 
the multitude of resources at his command were 
always conspicuous." 

His scholarly tastes were shown in his library, 
which contained not only the best collection, prob- 
ably, of works on international law in the country, 
as well as the largest one of Chinese works, but 
the classics of ancient and modern times. 

"Externally, Nature had stamped him as a man 
of distinguished character." His eyes were very 
penetrating, shooting out "keen glances." It is 
now known by recent researches that these physi- 



EEV. STEPHEN HIGGINSON TYNG. 97 

cal traits he inherited from the same ancestor 
from whom were also descended Webster, Whit- 
tier, and Pessenden. 

In his habits he was simple and temperate. 
Although courteous in manner he would not de- 
scend to court popularity. He was faithful to his 
clients, — as faithful to private individuals as to 
the different nations that had employed him, — 
while his integrity was above the breath of 
suspicion. 

Mr. Pish writes : " Prolific as Massachusetts 
has been of great men, great scholars, and great 
statesmen, she has produced few, if any, who in 
breadth of' genius, or in extent of learning, re- 
search, scholarship, or statesmanship, have sur- 
passed or equalled Mr. Cushing. To him the 
nation owes much." 



REV. STEPHEN HIGGINSON TYNG. 
1800. 

The Eev. Dr. Tyng is the son of Mr. Dudley 
Atkins, an able lawyer of Newburyport, who 
changed his name to Tyng to inherit property 
from a distant relative. 

After graduating at Harvard College in the 
class of 1817, having as classmates Caleb Cushing, 
the jurist and diplomatist, and George Bancroft, 



98 BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES. 

the historian, he entered the counting-house of 
an uncle in Boston, preparatory to a mercantile 
career. 

At nineteen, Mr. Tyng resolved to become a 
clergyman, his mind having been turned towards 
religious subjects in childhood. He had been 
baptized in Newburyport by Bishop Bass, the first 
Bishop of Massachusetts, and while a schoolboy 
in Andover had associated with the students of 
divinity, who used to discuss matters of theology. 
He began his theological studies under Bishop 
Griswold, in Bristol, Bhode Island, one of whose 
daughters he subsequently married. 

Young as he was, he acquired a habit of extem- 
poraneous speaking which was of great advantage 
to him in after life, as were also the business 
habits he had acquired, which prepared him to 
manage understanding^ the charitable and re- 
ligious funds committed to his care at various 
times. 

After being rector of a church in Georgetown, 
and then in Maryland for a time, he was invited 
to Philadelphia to take chargs of St. Paul's Church 
and subsequently of the Epiphany. 

In 1845, when the Convention met in Philadel- 
phia to select a bishop for Pennsylvania, Dr. 
Tyng was a prominent candidate ; and it is said 
that he would have become the successful aspir- 
ant if he had shown a proper zeal on his own 
behalf. The same year he accepted an invitation 



REV. STEPHEN HIGGINSON TYNG. 99 

from the important and flourishing Church of 
St. George in New York, where he passed many 
years in active duty. 

Dr. Tyng is an excellent scholar, and well read. 
His style of writing and of delivery is vigorous 
and forcible. His influence in his congregation 
and church was great, as his actions were 
prompted by a conscientious regard for what he 
considered his duty. Many works of his have 
been published, almost entirely of a theological 
nature. The principal are, " The Law and the 
Gospel," " Christ is All," " Commentary on the 
Four Gospels," " Forty Years' Experience in Sun- 
day-Schools." His sermon, " Christian Loyalty," 
preached on the day of fasting in 186S, during 
the crisis of the Civil War, was vigorous and pat- 
riotic. "I desire not to live to see a disunion of 
the States for any reasons and upon any terms." 
In speaking of the day (September 17, 1787) 
when the Constitution was signed by Washington 
and other delegates, he said, " It was the great 
constructing day of this nation, of which it may 
be said, the nation was born on it. I have won- 
dered that it has not been kept among the holi- 
days of the American people." 



100 BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES. 

WILLIAM LLOYD GARRISON. 
1805-1879. 

Almost under the shadow of the church where 
Whitefield's remains are buried, was born, in hum- 
ble circumstances, William Lloyd Garrison, who, 
after being for a short time in a shoemaker's 
and then in a cabinet-maker's shop, became a 
printer at an early age in the office of the New- 
buryport " Herald." 

Being industrious and ambitious he lost no 
opportunity for self-cultivation, and soon com- 
menced to write articles for the newspaper. His 
attention was called to the subject of the abolition 
of slavery, which had excited much discussion in 
Newburyport from early times. Judge Sewall 
had attacked the slave trade as early as 1700, 
writing and publishing a tract called the " Selling 
of Joseph." Later, Benjamin Colman of New- 
bury had displayed great earnestness in the cause 
of emancipation. Jonathan Jackson had been 
among the earliest to liberate a slave belonging 
to him ; and Eufus King, then a resident of New- 
buryport, had brought forward, as a delegate in 
the Congress of the old Confederation, his bill 
making the territory of the Northwest free ; 
which was afterwards adopted by Mr. Dane. 



WILLIAM LLOYD GARKISON. 101 

In 1829 Mr. Garrison, after editing for a time 
in Boston a paper called the "National Philan- 
thropist," which was probably the first paper ever 
published urging the total abstinence from intoxi- 
cating drinks, joined Mr. Benjamin Lundy in 
Baltimore, to aid him in publishing there the 
" Genius of Universal Emancipation." This aboli- 
tion paper being considered seditious and a fo- 
menter of trouble, a pretext was gladly seized 
to imprison Mr. Garrison upon a suit for libel 
brought against him in Baltimore by Mr. Francis 
Todd, of Newburyport. He was, however, liber- 
ated after a short incarceration, upon Mr. Arthur 
Tappan's paying the fine incurred. 

In 1831 Mr. Garrison commenced the publica- 
tion of the " Liberator," in Boston, assisted by Mr. 
Isaac Knapp, of Newburyport. In the spring of 
1833 he was sent to England for the purpose of 
counteracting the efforts of the American Coloni- 
zation Society and also of establishing friendly 
l relations with European abolitionists. As the 
representative of the New England Anti-Slavery 
Society he was well received by Wilberforce, 
Clarkson, Brougham, and others. 

The same year a national society was formed in 
Philadelphia, called the American Anti-Slavery 
Society, that city having been apparently chosen 
on account of the historical precedent. The new 
society, imitating the Continental Congress, issued 
a Declaration of Sentiments, which was written 



102 BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES. 

by Mr. Garrison. After stating the reasons for 
founding the Society, the object to be attained, 
and the means to be adopted, the Declaration 
ends as follows : " Pledging ourselves that, under 
the guidance and by the help of Almighty God, 
we will do all that in us lies, consistently with 
this declaration of our principles, to overthrow the 
most execrable system of slavery that has ever 
been witnessed upon earth ; to deliver our land 
from its deadliest curse ; to wipe out the foulest 
stain which rests upon our national escutcheon ; 
and to secure to the colored population of the 
United States all the rights and privileges which 
belong to them as men and as Americans, come 
what may to our persons, our interests, or our 
reputation, whether we live to witness the tri- 
umph of liberty, justice, and humanity, or perish 
untimely as martyrs in this great, benevolent, and 
holy cause." 

The opposition to anti-slavery agitation in the 
country became so strong that a riot took place in 
New York in 1834, occasioned by a meeting of 
abolitionists there, and troubles also arose in 
Philadelphia, and the next year Mr. Garrison had 
to be conveyed to prison in Boston to escape the 
fury of his opponents. In the Southern States a 
price was placed upon his head, as well as upon 
that of Mr. Arthur Tappan, who was President 
of the American Anti-Slavery Society. 

Mr. Garrison differed from many of his friends, 



WILLIAM LLOYD GARRISON. 103 

in demanding immediate emancipation. He was 
impatient of any delay, and was consequently 
opposed to a gradual manumission, such as had 
taken place in Europe in the abolition of villenage 
and serfdom, and in the Northern States in giving 
freedom to the colored population ; as, for in- 
stance, in New York, where the act passed in 
1799 was not fully completed until 1827, and in 
the English West India Islands, where the emanci- 
pation commencing in 1834 did not actually end 
until four years after, and a system of apprentice- 
ship established for a certain number of years, as 
intermediary between servitude and freedom. 

He opposed also any idea of compensation. 
"We maintain that no compensation should be 
given to the planters emancipating their slaves, 
because it would be a surrender of the great fun- 
damental principle, that man could hold property 
in man." In this he was in opposition to the Act 
of the English Parliament, which gave £20,000,000 
to the West India planters, at the proportion of 
£25 for each slave. Mr. Garrison, in speaking of 
this, says, " The West Indian body in Parliament 
succeeded in burdening the Act of Emancipation 
with a gift of £20,000,000 sterling, as a compen- 
sation for imaginary losses, and with an appren- 
ticeship system to last for seven years." 

Mr. Elihu Burritt, considering the English view 
just and equitable, and that the losses of the 
Southern planters would not be imaginary but 



104 BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES. 

real, advocated the same plan for the United 
States. He proposed that the national govern- 
ment should purchase all the slaves, paying for 
each one $250, double the amount paid by Eng- 
land, making a total of $875,000,000. He claimed 
that many of the Southern States would embrace 
speedily, and all, in time, the offer, and that the 
South, finding that the North did not wish to 
decree against them an act of confiscation, would 
become again friendly towards the Union. These 
views did not suit Mr. Garrison, whose utterances 
were vehement, defiant, and uncompromising, and 
who had become, if possible, more violent, — some 
of his former friends having deserted him, and an 
attempt having been made to deprive him of his 
ascendency in the Society. 

As the Constitution had been a compromise 
between slave-holding and free States, Mr. Gar- 
rison attacked it in violent terms. " I know," he 
said, " that there is much declamation about the 
sacredness of the compact which was formed be- 
tween the free and the slave States in the adop- 
tion of the national Constitution. A sacred 
compact forsooth ! I pronounce it the most bloody 
and heaven-daring arrangement ever made by 
man for the continuance and protection of the 
most atrocious villany ever exhibited on earth ; 
yes, I recognize the compact, but with feelings of 
indignation and shame, and it will be held in 
everlasting infamy by the friends of humanity 



WILLIAM LLOYD GARRISON. 105 

and justice throughout the world. A sacred com- 
pact ! A sacred compact ! What then is wicked 
and ignominious ? " 

At another time he called, in biblical language, 
the Constitution " a covenant with death," " an 
agreement with hell." "No union with slave- 
holders" became the motto of the Anti-Slavery 
Society in 1844, and the members weTe willing 
to separate from the slave-holding States of the 
South, thinking that a disruption of the Union 
would be better than an alliance with what they 
considered a crime. Mr. Sumner writes in 1845 : 
"I never heard Garrison before. He spoke with 
natural eloquence. Hillard spoke exquisitely. 
His words descended in a golden shower ; but 
Garrison's fell in fiery rain. It seemed doubtful, 
at one time, if the Abolitionists would not succeed 
in carrying the Convention. Their proposals were 
voted down ; though a very respectable number 
of the Convention were in favor of a dissolution 
of the Union, in the event of the annexation of 
Texas." 

"From 1844 to 1861 the Garrisonian agitation 
proceeded upon the ground of the inherent defile- 
ment of the Constitution." 

Upon the breaking out of the Civil War in 1861, 
Mr. Garrison, thinking that probably slavery 
would perish in the conflict, became an up- 
holder of the Union, instead of an opponent, and 
although a firm believer in the principles of non- 



106 BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES. 

resistance, approved of the war and of all warlike 
measures ; it does not appear, however, that he 
ever offered his services to the government. 

" During the first two years of the war Mr. 
Garrison, in common with all other friends of 
freedom, was exceedingly impatient with what 
seemed to be the uncertain, shilly-shally policy of 
President Lincoln. . . . But when at last he issued 
his Proclamation of Emancipation and committed 
himself fully to the work of exterminating slavery 
Mr. Garrison distrusted him no longer, and took 
the most charitable view of such of his acts as he 
could not wholly approve." 

He lived to see the end of the struggle, which 
resulted in the total destruction of servitude in 
the country. " Still I cannot forget," writes one 
of the leading abolitionists, " that it was the 
madness of the slave power alone that opened 
the way to this glorious consummation." 

He was among the guests invited by the Na- 
tional Government in April, 1865, to witness the 
replacing of the American flag upon the walls of 
Fort Sumter, where the first blow of secession 
had been struck four years before, and he was 
enthusiastically received by the freedmeu at 
Charleston. 

Two years after he again visited Europe, when 
a public breakfast was given to him in London, 
at which were present Earl Russell, John Bright, 
John Stuart Mill, Herbert Spencer, and other 



CORNELIUS CONWAY FELTON. 107 

distinguished men. At Edinburgh the freedom 
of the city was conferred upon him. He ex- 
tended his journey to France, Switzerland, and 
a part of Germany, " but was sorely tried while 
on the Continent by his inability to speak the 
language and converse with the people, and con- 
stantly expatiated on the need of a universal 
language for all the nations of the earth." 

In 1877 he visited England once more, refusing, 
however, proffered hospitalities on account of ill 
health. At his funeral, in Eoxbury, in 1879, 
were gathered his chief friends, Mr. Wendell 
Phillips delivering the principal address. 

Mr. Whittier has written of him : " The private 
lives of many who fought well the battles of hu- 
manity have not been without spot or blemish. 
But his private character, like his public, knew 
no dishonor." 



CORNELIUS CONWAY FELTON. 

1807-1862. 

After preparing himself with great earnestness 
for college, Mr. Eelton, who was the son of a 
West Newbury farmer, entered Harvard in 1823. 
"While in college he was distinguished for his 
literary tastes and the wide range of his studies." 
Greek was, however, his favorite study, which lie 



108 BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES. 

pursued outside of the regular college course, Dr. 
Popkin, the Professor of Greek, assisting him. 

After graduating, in 1827, he was for two years 
the principal of a school in the interior of the 
State of New York, and was then summoned to 
Cambridge to take the position of tutor of Latin 
in the University. The next year he was ap- 
pointed tutor of Greek, and in the short space of 
two years was elected to the college professorship 
of that language. In 1834 he was promoted to the 
Eliot Professorship of Greek Literature, vacated 
by the learned Dr. Popkin, and this position he 
retained until he was made President of the L^ni- 
versity in 1860. 

In his inaugural address he said : u I have 
accepted the office of president of this ancient 
university, not ignorant of its labors, nor inex- 
perienced in its anxieties. . . . Our Puritan an- 
cestors brought with them from Oxford and 
Cambridge the scholarship of England. They 
were among the best educated men of their times. 
They were among the noblest men of all times. 
... A solid character is not the growth of a 
day ; the intellectual faculties are not matured 
without long and rigorous culture. To refine the 
taste is a laborious process; to store the mind 
with sound and solid learning is the work of calm 
and studious years. It is the business of the 
higher education to check this fretful impatience 
which possesses us, this crude and eager haste to 



COKNELIUS CONWAY FELTON. 109 

drink the cup of life which drives us onward to 
exhaust the intoxicating draught of ambition. . . . 
Without discipline there is no spontaneous action 
worth having, no inspiration that deserves to be 
listened to." 

In speaking of Mr. Felton's accomplishments 
as a Greek scholar, President Woolsey, of Yale 
College, writes : "As a Greek scholar he was 
not surpassed for breadth and accuracy by any 
other in the land." His Greek Eeader passed 
through many editions ; his edition of Homer, 
'Clouds" of Aristophanes, "Agamemnon" of JKs- 
chylus, and " Birds " of Aristophanes received 
merited praise. Upon his return from his first 
visit to Greece he published, in 1856, a selection 
of modern Greek writers. His " Lectures on An- 
cient and Modern Greece," published in two vol- 
umes, are very comprehensive, and exhibit great 
study. In this work he writes : " We should 
study Homer, but Milton also ; we should make 
Shakespeare the companion of iEschylus, Soph- 
ocles, and Euripides ; and Aristophanes should be 
illustrated by Goldsmith and Sheridan." 

In speaking of the Greek language he writes : 
" The history of the Greek language is one of the 
most interesting subjects of literary investigation. 
Men of the clearest judgment unite with enthu- 
siastic scholars in declaring it to be unrivalled for 
richness, copiousness, and strength. . . . Whence 
came this curiously contrived instrument of human 
thought ? " 



110 BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES. 

In addition to his works on Greece and Grecian 
literature, Mr. Felton wrote many magazine arti- 
cles, principally for the " North American Re- 
view," and translated several works from German 
and French. His articles in the " North Ameri- 
can Eeview " cover a great variety of topics, 
showing patient work and a great fund of knowl- 
edge. His principal articles are : " Dunlop's His- 
tory of the Arts," " Probus," " Hyperion," " Schil- 
ler's ' William Tell,' " " La Fontaine," " Charles 
Dickens," " Modern Art in Germany," " Everett's 
Orations," and " On Translating Homer." 

In one of his essays he writes : " The love of 
the old is connected with the best and highest 
feelings of our nature. The past is sacred. It is 
set beyond the revolutions of nature and the shift- 
ing institutions of man. So much of beauty, of 
experience, of wisdom, is secure from the touch 
of change. He who would destroy this treasury of 
the heart and mind by rudely assailing our rev- 
erence for the old would rob human life of half 
of its charm, and nearly all its refinement." 

After occupying the presidency of the Univer- 
sity for the short space of two years, Mr. Felton 
died, in 1862, lamented by his friends, not only in 
America but in Europe. Dr. Hill wrote from 
Athens : " The king and queen have expressed 
their sincere sorrow. . . . Felton's death is deeply 
lamented here by his numerous friends." The 
king had shown much attention to Mr. Felton 



EEV. LEONAED WOODS, JE. Ill 

when in Greece, and had offered him the use of 
the royal yacht with which to make excursions to 
points of historical interest. At the request of 
the Smithsonian Institution, Mr. Felton having 
been one of the regents, a eulogy was prepared 
by President Woolsey, in which he says : " Mr. 
Felton's nature was many-sided. His mind was 
well-rounded, well-balanced, where no trait was 
deficient. . . . His kindly nature showed itself in 
forms of sociability, friendliness, and generosity, 
reaching even to self-sacrifice." 



REV. LEONARD WOODS, JR 

1807-1878. 

The contrast between the views of a clergyman 
of the old school, like the Eev. Dr. Leonard 
Woods, and those of his son, bearing the same 
name, is very striking, and shows the rapid change 
that has taken place in a single generation. The 
father, a clergyman of West Newbury, was consid- 
ered at one time, from his very numerous and for- 
cible controversial writings, to be the champion 
of Orthodox Calvinism, and was on account of his 
strict views appointed to a professorship in the 
Theological School at Andover when that institu- 
tion was first established. 



112 BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES. 

After preparing for college at Phillips Academy, 
Andover, ^lr. Leonard Woods, Jr., entered Dart- 
mouth College, where he remained, however, only 
one year. He then became a student at Union 
College in New York, graduating in 1827 with 
the highest honors of his class. "As a scholar 
he excelled in all branches. ... As a poet, he 
showed such promise that many of his friends 
believed that poetry was his true vocation. . . . 
His form was light and spare, his features of 
almost feminine softness," but " allied with manly 
firmness and resolution." 

After passing his examinations at the Andover 
Theological School in 1830, and performing the 
duties of assistant instructor of Hebrew for a 
time, he translated and published, with notes, 
Knapp's "Theology." "This achievement secured 
him at once a prominent position among the 
scholars and theologians of the country." 

After having charge of a church in New York, 
where he preached with great force and eloquence, 
and being editor of the New York " Literary and 
Theological Eeview," he was appointed, in 1836, 
Professor of Biblical Literature in the theological 
school at Bangor. His reputation became such 
that in 1839, when scarcely thirty-two years of 
age, he was selected for the responsible position 
of President of Bowdoin College. 

Upon visiting Europe a short time after his 
inauguration, he was well received at Oxford by 



EEV. LEONAED WOODS, JE. 113 

Pusey, Newman, and Stanley. In Paris he had 
the honor of dining with the citizen-king, Louis 
Philippe, and in Eome had an interview with 
Gregory XVI., with whom he conversed in Latin, 
making a most favorable impression upon his 
Holiness. He examined carefully the working of 
the different educational establishments in Eu- 
rope, lay as well as clerical. 

Upon his return he devoted himself with 
renewed energy to the duties of his position. He 
believed more in moral suasion than in strict dis- 
cipline, and tried to win the affections of the 
students by his urbanity and kindness. His tem- 
perament being poetical, and his studies causing 
him to dwell much on the past, for which lie had 
great reverence, his theological views were broad. 
" He revered antiquity. He held to the substance 
of his father's creed, not only because he deemed it 
accurate, but also because he deemed it ancient ; " 
but " sectarian bitterness was his abhorrence." 

When the Civil War threatened to burst on the 
country, he opposed strongly the use of force. 
" Our President," writes one who had been a stu- 
dent in the college, "having little faith in the 
power of even college discipline, shrank from the 
bloody discipline inflicted by the nation. He did 
not believe that hearts would be won and patriot- 
ism created by the bayonet and the cannon." 
His views estranged him from many of his old 
friends, and his influence was consequently much 



114 BIOGK APHICAL - SKETCHES. 

diminished. He therefore thought it his duty to 
resign the presidency in 1866. 

The next year he was commissioned by the 
Governor to collect documents for the history of 
the State of Maine. After gathering in Europe 
much material,' some of which was published, and 
almost completing his work, his library, with its 
valuable manuscripts, notes, and books, was in 
1874 almost totally destroyed by fire. His health, 
delicate before, broke down at this catastrophe. 

His notes for the introduction to the second 
volume of the " Documentary History of Maine " 
were, happily, saved. By the care and skill of 
Mr. Charles Deane, of Cambridge, they were 
arranged and published. 

After Dr. Woods's death, in 1878, the faculty 
of Bowdoin College passed resolutions, saying : 
" We have heard with deep sorrow of the death of 
Dr. Woods, who, through a long and brilliant ser- 
vice in the presidency of this college, filled the 
best years of his life with unwearied efforts to pro- 
mote its efficiency, to elevate its intellectual and 
moral character, to increase its resources, and to 
give it an honorable and influential position among 
the educational institutions of the country." 

The principal works left by Dr. Woods are a 
eulogy on Webster and a lecture on the " Liberties 
of the Ancient Eepublics." As a preacher he was 
eloquent and impressive, and as a conversational- 
ist had few equals. 



REV. THOMAS MARCH CLARK. 115 

EEV. THOMAS MARCH CLARK. 
1812. 

After graduating at Yale College in 1831, and 
subsequently studying divinity at the Theological 
Seminary in Princeton, and being licensed to 
preach by the Presbytery of Newburyport, the 
Eev. Thomas M. Clark entered the Episcopal 
Church, and was ordained in 1836. 

As rector of Grace Church in Boston, of St. An- 
drew's, Philadelphia, assistant minister of Trinity 
in Boston, and rector of Christ Church, Hartford, 
his kindly and genial nature won for him many 
warm friends and well-wishers. In 1854 he was 
elevated to the bishopric of Rhode Island, a 
position he still worthily occupies. 

Several of his sermons, lectures, and orations 
have been published, the principal of which are 
an historical discourse in commemoration of the 
one hundred and fiftieth anniversary of St. John's 
Church in Providence ; " Primary Truths of Re- 
ligion ; " " Lack of Religious Culture Fatal to 
our Public and Social System ; " " Influence of 
Thought," an oration delivered before the Phi 
Beta Kappa Society of Union College ; and " Lec- 
tures on the Formation of Character," in which 
he says : " Religion is exhibited as something 



116 BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES. 

peculiar to the sanctuary and the closet and 
the sick-bed and the Sabbath ; but as having 
nothing to do in making a bargain, in the state- 
ment of accounts, in contracts and bonds ; noth- 
ing to do in the workshop, the office, and the 
counting-house. An unnatural divorce between 
religion and the ordinary business of life has been 
declared, — what God has joined together, man 
has taken the liberty to put asunder. . . . The 
passive tolerance extended to successful fraud 
operates as a premium upon dishonesty. . . . There 
are certain forms of crime which can be punished 
only at the tribunal of public opinion. . . . Society 
for its own protection, should withdraw its fellow- 
ship from the offender." 

In his discourse on the " Eelations of the Past 
to the Present," delivered before the Ancient and 
Honorable Artillery Company, Dr. Clark says, 
contrasting the epochs : " The wakeful sentinel 
kept watch in the lonely tower while the house- 
hold slept ; the raised drawbridge excluded all 
unseasonable visitors, and everything indicated 
that society was ruled by might." Now, " every 
poor man's house has become a castle, before 
which law stands sentinel. . . . The progress of 
all salutary and abiding reformation is like the 
advance of the rising tide, which is by successive 
advance and retreat, so gradual and imperceptible 
that you can know that it flows only by the land- 
marks which one after another are submerged. 



BENJAMIN PEELEY POOEE. 117 

. . . What will be the prominent characteristic of 
the intellectual era towards which we are tending ? 
There will be a fairer adjustment of the relations 
existing between form and substance, language 
and thought, dogma and spirit." 

In 1883 Bishop Clark delivered, by invitation, 
before the General Convention at Philadelphia, 
the sermon in commemoration of the hundredth 
anniversary of the organization of the American 
Episcopal Church. 



BENJAMIN PERLEY POORE. 
1820. 

The Poore family has for eight generations 
occupied what is known as the " Indian Hill 
Farm," in West Newbury, where guests are wel- 
comed by Major Ben: Perley Poore with gen- 
uine hospitality. The house, surrounded with 
fine trees and well-kept lawns, resembles an old 
English mausion. The interior is picturesque, and 
is filled with objects of historic interest. 

Mr. Poore has gained a wide-spread reputation 
as a journalist and author. He was the historical 
agent of Massachusetts in France from 1844 to 
1848, compiling several volumes of important his- 
torical documents, extending from 1492 to 1780, 
which have not yet been printed. His principal 
published works are, " A Short Account of the 
Early Life of Napoleon Bonaparte," "The Rise 



118 BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES. 

and Fall of Louis Philippe," an interesting book 
in which the vicissitudes of the prince are graphi- 
cally told, Mr. Poore having as a boy seen the 
King of the French not long after his elevation 
to the throne and again just before his downfall. 
A quotation describing the arrival in Paris of the 
band of ruffians from Marseilles, in the first Revo- 
lution, gives an idea of the style in which the 
book is written : " Their bronzed faces, with eyes 
of fire, their uniforms covered with the dust of 
their journey, their red woollen caps, shaded with 
green boughs, the absence of discipline with which 
they either carried their muskets or dragged them 
after them, their harsh provincial accent mingled 
with oaths, their ferocious gestures, — all struck 
the imagination of the multitude with great force. 
The revolutionary idea seemed impersonated and 
to be marching to the last assault of Royalty, 
chanting an air whose notes seemed to come from 
the breast with sullen mutterings of national 
anger, and then with the joy of victory." 

The lives of several eminent Americans have 
also been written by Mr. Poore, and a compila- 
tion arranged of the Federal and State Constitu- 
tions, Colonial Charters, and other organic laws 
of the United States, by order of the Senate. He 
is also the compiler of the valuable Congressional 
directory, and is still an able newspaper corre- 
spondent from Washington, where his social expe- 
riences have been most interesting. 



ADOLPHUS WASHINGTON GKEELY. 119 



ADOLPHUS WASHINGTON GKEELY. 
1844. 

At the beginning of the Civil War Adolphus 
W. Greely entered as a private, at the youthful 
age of seventeen, in the volunteer forces, and after 
attaining the rank of first sergeant in the Nine- 
teenth Massachusetts regiment, was promoted, in 
1863, to a second lieutenancy in a regiment of col- 
ored troops. The next year he became a first lieu- 
tenant, and in 1865 obtained a captaincy. He was 
in many of the hard-fought battles in the East, 
being wounded at the battle of White Oak Swamp 
and again at Antietam, and he participated also in 
the siege of Port Hudson in the West. Being 
honorably discharged, with the rank of brevet- 
major of volunteers, in 1867, he was the same year 
appointed to a second lieutenancy in the present 
Seventh regiment of infantry of the regular army. 
He was subsequently transferred to the Fifth 
Cavalry, and was promoted to a first lieutenancy 
in 1868. 

Having served as chief signal officer in the de- 
partment of the Platte, and being a good scholar, 
familiar with French and German as well as the 
classics, he was assigned, in 1871, to the Chief 
Signal Office in Washington, to which he is still 



120 BIOGKAPHICAL SKETCHES. 

attached. He showed great energy in construct- 
ing military telegraph lines in Texas and in some 
of the Western Territories, and " while on duty in 
the Weather Bureau as the predicting officer, 
made the first official forecast for a longer period 
than twenty-four hours, foretelling in 1880 two 
days and a half in advance." 

Having been a student of Arctic explorations 
for some time, and having had experience for 
twelve years in the signal service, he was well 
qualified to be the head of the scientific Lady 
Franklin Bay expedition, which sailed from St. 
Johns, Newfoundland, July 7, 1881. He, as well 
as his comrades, showed great courage and endur- 
ance in this expedition ; after the most northerly 
point, it is said, ever reached by man had been 
attained by part of his command, and the geo- 
graphical knowledge of the polar regions having 
been considerably augmented, and the whole 
party having been brought back in safety to the 
appointed station, they were confronted by the 
appalling prospect of a slow death caused by 
the miscarriage of the expected provisions. Those 
still alive were finally rescued on June 22, 1884, 
by the relief squadron sent by the United States 
authorities, aided and stimulated, however, by the 
gift of a vessel named the " Alert," presented by 
the English Government. 

In appreciation of his high qualities, and grate- 
ful for his preservation, the civic authorities of 



BI0GEAPH1CAL SKETCHES. 121 

Newburyport accorded to Lieutenant Greely and 
his companions a public reception, July 15, 1884, 
when the city put on its festive garb, and speeches 
were made, the principal being by Mr. Richard S. 
Spofford, Jr., and Colonel Eben F. Stone, the mem- 
ber of Congress from the district. 



RESIDENTS BORN ELSEWHERE. 

Besides being the birthplace of many distin- 
guished men, Newbury, Newburyport, and West 
Newbury have been the permanent or temporary 
residence of not a few persons, born elsewhere, 
who have acquired a reputation in their various 
callings. 

The Rev. John Tufts, born in Medford. in 1689, 
a graduate of Harvard in 1708, was the minister 
of the Second Church in Newbury from 1714 to 
1738. In the first year of his ministry he pub- 
lished, in Newburyport, an " Introduction to the 
Singing of Psalm-Tunes." Mr. Coffin, the historian, 
says : " It was at this time a great novelty, it being 
the first publication of the kind in New England, 
if not in America. As late as 1700 there were 
not more than four or five tunes known in many 
of the congregations in this country, and in some 
not more than two or three, and even those were 
sung altogether by rote. These tunes were 'York,' 



122 BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES. 

' Hackney,' ' Saint Mary's,' ' Windsor,' and ' Mar- 
tyrs.' To publish at this time a book on music, 
containing the enormous number of twenty-eight 
psalm-tunes (which were in three parts, and 
purely choral), although it was only a reprint of 
' Eavenscroft,' which was first published in 1618, 
was a daring innovation on the old time-honored 
customs of the country ; and the attempt to teach 
singing by note thus commenced by Mr. Tufts 
was most strenuously resisted, and for many years, 
by that large class of persons, everywhere to be 
found, who believe that an old error is better than 
a new truth. Many at that time imagined that 
fa, sol, la, was, in reality, nothing but popery in 
disguise." 

Eev. Dr. Edward Bass, born in Dorchester in 
1726, graduated at Harvard College in 1744 The 
next year he became the rector of St. Paul's 
Church, Newburyport, a position he filled with 
marked success for fifty-one years. In 1796 he 
was elevated to the bishopric of Massachusetts 
and Rhode Island, being the first bishop of the 
diocese. After occupying the high position, which 
he had merited by his attainments, for the short 
space of seven years, he died in 1803. It was 
said of him that he united " the character of a 
sound divine, an erudite scholar, a polished 
gentleman, and a devout Christian." 

Eev. Jonathan Parsons, born in West Spring- 
field in 1705, graduating at Yale College in 1729, 



BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES. 123 

became pastor of the First Presbyterian Church in 
Newburyport in 1746, a position he filled with 
eminent ability until his death, in 1776. " He 
could write in Latin with unusual elegance and 
purity. His critical skill in Greek was consid- 
erable, and in Hebrew learning I suppose he 
.exceeded most of his brethren in the ministry in 
this remote corner of the earth. : . . His imagina- 
tion was rich, his voice clear and commanding, 
varying with every varying passion, — now forcible, 
majestic, terrifying, and now soft and persuasive 
and melting." A selection of his sermons, sixty 
in number, was made and published in Newbury- 
port in 1779, three years after his death. His 
son, Samuel Holden Parsons, born in 1737, passed 
his boyhood in Newburyport, graduating at Har- 
vard College in 1756. After studying law with 
his uncle, Governor Griswold, of Connecticut, he 
established himself in New London in 1774. At 
the breaking out of the Eevolutionary War he 
entered the military service and became colonel 
of the Sixth Connecticut regiment. He was at 
one time one of Washington's aidcs-de-camjJ, and 
in 1780 was promoted to the rank of major-gen- 
eral. In 1789 he was appointed by Washington 
a judge of the Northwest Territory. Shortly after 
reaching his post of duty he was accidentally 
drowned. During his brief residence in the West 
he had published a work, "Antiquities of the 
Western States." 



124 BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES. 

Eev. George Whitefield, the hard-working and 
enthusiastic English preacher, a friend of John 
and Charles Wesley at Oxford, after passing more 
than half of his active life in America, died in 
Newburyport, at the house of his fellow-worker, 
the Rev. Jonathan Parsons, who delivered the 
funeral sermon. Mr. Whitefield was a man of 
untiring energy and of stirring eloquence, and 
his influence was consequently widely felt. He 
was buried under the pulpit of the Federal Street 
Church. On the stone monument placed in the 
church by the liberality of Mr. William Bartlet, 
is the following inscription : " This cenotaph is 
erected with affectionate veneration to the mem- 
ory of the Rev. George Whitefield, born in Glou- 
cestershire, December 16, 1714, educated at Oxford 
University, ordained in 1736. In a ministry of 
thirty-four years he crossed the Atlantic thirteen 
times, and preached more than eighteen hundred 
sermons. As a soldier of the cross, humble, de- 
vout, ardent, he put on the whole armor of God, 
preferring the honor of Christ to his own interest, 
repose, and reputation and life. As a Christian 
orator, his deep piety, disinterested zeal, and vivid 
imagination gave unexampled energy to his look, 
utterance, and action. Bold, ardent, pungent, and 
popular in his eloquence, no other uninspired 
man preached to so large assemblies or enforced 
the simple truths of the gospel by motives so 
persuasive and awful, and with an influence so 



BIOGKAPHICAL SKETCHES. 125 

powerful on the hearts of his hearers. He died 
of asthma, September 30, 1770, suddenly exchang- 
ing his life of unparalleled labors for his eternal 
rest." 

Nicholas Pike, son of Eev. James Pike, grad- 
uating at Harvard College in 1766, became a 
resident of Newburyport, where, after holding 
a local magistracy for many years, he died in 
1819, at the age of seventy-six. His system of 
arithmetic, published in Newburyport in 1788, 
was the first book of the kind printed in America. 
General Washington wrote a complimentary letter 
to Mr. Pike in regard to it, and Professor Theoph- 
ilus Parsons speaks of it as being such an excel- 
lent book as to have superseded all works of a 
similar kind in New England. 

Isaiah Thomas, the noted printer, whose " His- 
tory of Printing," published in 1810, was a valu- 
able contribution to the subject, and who was in 
1812 the founder and president of the Antiquarian 
Society of Worcester, began his business career in 
Newburyport in 1767, when only eighteen years 
of age. 

Eufus King, born in the Province of Maine in 
1755, after completing his college course at Har- 
vard in 1777, studied law in the office of Theophi- 
lus Parsons at Newburyport, and was admitted 
to the Bar in 1780. He soon became so promi- 
nent in his adopted home that he was chosen to 
represent Newburyport at the General Court only 



126 BIOCRAPHICAL SKETCHES. 

two years after his admission to the Bar, and was 
then sent, in 1784, to represent the State in the 
Congress of the old Confederation. In that body- 
he brought forward, in 1785, his famous Resolu- 
tion, that "there be neither slavery nor involun- 
tary servitude in any of the States described in 
the Resolution of April, 1784, otherwise than 
in punishment of crime, and that this regulation 
shall be made an article of compact and remain a 
fundamental principle of the Constitution." This 
resolution was, by the votes of seven States against 
four, referred to a Committee of the whole, and 
was almost word for word embodied by Nathan 
Dane in the ordinance of 1787. Having been 
a member of the Constitutional Convention of 
1787 in Philadelphia, and a member from New- 
buryport to the State Convention the next year, 
voting in favor of adopting the National Constitu- 
tion, Mr. King became, in 1788, a resident of New 
York, where, after filling with marked ability 
some of the most important positions, at home 
and abroad, in the gift of the government, he 
died in 1827. 

Among the law pupils of Theophilus Parsons 
was John Quincy Adams, who at an early age 
showed marks of ability. When Washington 
visited Newburyport in 1789, Mr. Adams, still 
a student of law, was selected to write the address 
of welcome. Nearly fifty years afterwards, in 
1837, he delivered, by invitation of the town, the 



BIOGEAPHICAL SKETCHES. 127 

Fourth of July oration, the manuscript of which 
is preserved in the Public Library : " The present 
season completes fifty years since I came, as a 
student at law, to reside for a term of three years 
at Newburyport, . . . endeared to me by the in- 
delible impressions of an early youth." 

Another law-student in the office of Theophilus 
Parsons was Eobert Treat Paine, who adopted his 
father's name instead of Thomas, in order, as he 
said, " not to be confounded with Thomas Paine 
the infidel." Mr. Paine did not confine himself to 
the pursuit of legal knowledge, but indulged in 
poetical effusions, having shown early consider- 
able poetical talent. He was selected by the 
authorities of Newburyport to write and deliver 
the eulogy at the funeral celebration of Washing- 
ton in 1800. Its success was marked, and gave to 
Mr. Paine a wide-spread reputation at the time. 

Dr. Francis Vergnies, a native of France, was 
driven from the island of San Domingo in 1793, 
by the fury of the French Revolution, being among 
the proscribed, and established himself in New- 
buryport, where he gained by his medical skill and 
urbanity of manners the confidence and esteem of 
the entire community. His scientific reputation 
gained for him the admission into many learned 
societies ; and Harvard University conferred upon 
him the degree of Doctor of Laws. After his 
death, in 1830, at the age of eighty-three, it was 
discovered, by means of his library, which came 



128 BIOGEAPHICAL SKETCHES. 

into the possession of Dr. Francis V. Noyes, that 
his real name was Vergennes, — a family well 
known in the history of France. 

Among the many able ministers, not natives of 
the town, who have filled the various pulpits, one 
of the most conspicuous, if not the most conspic- 
uous, was Rev. Dr. John Snelling Popkin, a grad- 
uate of Harvard, of the class of 1792, who for 
eleven years, from 1804 to 1815, was the pastor of 
the First Parish of Newburyport. He was a man 
of eminent ability, and much beloved by his con- 
gregation. He was considered one of the ablest 
Greek scholars of the country, and on account of 
his proficiency was elected to the Greek professor- 
ship at Cambridge. 

Eev. Dr. Leonard Withington, born in 1789, at 
the beginning of the French Ee volution, gradu- 
ated at Yale College, 1814, and became pastor of 
the First Church, Newbury, in 1816. He has 
published the " Puritan," and " Solomon's Song 
Translated and Explained," and is the author of 
several other works. He is still living in the 
former field of his clerical labors, like a patriarch 
of old, surrounded by his family, and much re- 
spected by his friends and neighbors. 

Rev. Dr. Daniel T. Fiske, born in 1819, gradu- 
ated at the Andover Theological School in 1846. 
The next year he was ordained in Newburyport, 
and is still pastor of the Belleville Church. Dr. 
Fiske preserves the traditions of the old school in 



BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES. 129 

urbanity of manners, dignity and gentleness of 
expression, and intellectual strength. 

George Peabody, the banker and philanthropist, 
was, in 1811, for a time in ISTewburyport, in busi- 
ness with his brother. The kindness he received 
from the inhabitants of the town he never forgot. 
In later years he presented to the Public Library 
of the city the sum of fifteen thousand dollars, 
and his portrait, which he sent from England. 

John Pierpont, the lawyer, the clergyman, and 
poet, was admitted to the Bar of Newburyport in 
1812. The same year he was appointed one of 
the town committee to draft a resolution con- 
demning the war with England, which was unpop- 
ular throughout New England. After practising 
his profession for some time he left Newburyport 
for broader fields. 

Miss Hannah Elagg Gould, the poetess, after a 
residence of many years in Newburyport, died 
there in 1865, at the age of seventy-six, having 
acquired considerable reputation by her poems, 
published principally in 1832, 1836, and 1841. 

James Parton, who has achieved a merited suc- 
cess as a writer and lecturer, has chosen New- 
buryport as his residence. His biographies of 
Franklin, Aaron Burr, General Jackson, and other 
distinguished Americans, as well as his very ex- 
haustive and interesting " Life of Voltaire," which 
is considered the best ever published, have given 
him a high rank among literary men, while his 



130 BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES. 

habitual courtesy of manner and kindly actions 
have won for him a large place in the regards of 
his adopted city. 

Mrs. Harriet Prescott Spofford, who became a 
resident of Newburyport by her marriage with 
Mr. Eichard S. Spofford, Jr., a prominent citizen, 
is widely known for her literary labors, while her 
refinement and charm of manners have endeared 
her to a large circle of friends. 



Etoo pjunoreti ano jFtfttctfj 'Enmbersarg of 
tijc Settlement of Itfctoourg 



BRIEF 
BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES 



BY 



ROBERT NOXON TOPPAN 




NEWBURYPORT 

PUBLISHED BY THE SOCIETY 

1885 



